Endeavour NCC194: Phobos
by LeBiff
Summary: When Endeavour comes to the aid of the Federation research vessel Von Braun the crew find themselves beseiged by their worst fears. And for Alex Nain, her nightmares can be very dark indeed.
1. Chapter 1

**ENDEAVOUR NCC-194**

_Phobos_

**Legal**

_Star Trek_ was created by Gene Roddenberry and is the property of Paramount Pictures.

All members of the _Endeavour_ crew and the rest of the material in this story is my own work.

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**_Chapter One_**

_December 2, 2164 _

"Look at all the rides! Roller coasters and log rides and haunted houses and…" Her excited little voice faded away as she skipped ahead, cobalt blue eyes darting around, full of joy and wonder.

"_And…and…and…and…"_ Mimicked Kana Nain, following behind the child, stomping her immaterial feet. When Alex, her human host and best friend, had planned this day out as a treat for Susan, Kana had protested from the start. Amusement parks were not her idea of good fun. Her complaints had fallen on deaf ears.

Alex Nain, a short woman with spiky red hair and matching eyes, cast a look over her shoulder at the spectral form of her alien other self. Her mental voice chided, _"You're not still complaining?"_

"_I'm in no hurry to stop."_

"_This is for Susan. Come on, don't you think the poor kid deserves a little fun every now and then?"_

"_And why should her fun be torture for me?"_

"_Because you have no idea how to have a good time. Come on, Kana, you used to love roller coasters."_

"_No, that was you."_

"_Can't be. I _still_ like roller coasters," _she grinned.

"Alex?"

The voice shook her back into the real world with a start. She blinked, surprised to find the pale, angular, but not unattractive face of Doctor Sarn watching her closely. The Vulcan officer was an attachment to the _Endeavour_ from her people's government. Since very few Vulcans were willing to officially join the human-dominated Starfleet, most of the Vulcans on Federation starships were exchange officers of one kind or another. Technically, she was on a temporary assignment, one that could end at any time, but Alex considered her very much to be a part of the crew. She had missed her terribly during the _Endeavour_'s recent action in rescuing the captured _Starship Daedalus_ from the Vyar.

"Something wrong, Sarn?"

"You seem distracted."

A ready smile took its place on Alex's thin lips. "Off in my own little world. As usual. I was thinking of all the times I visited theme parks in my childhood. I loved them."

"Indeed. I hope that Susan finds today's experience a pleasurable one."

"That's the plan, isn't it?"

Susan was an Augment, a genetically engineered human being, created by a secret section of Starfleet Intelligence to be the perfect espionage agent. She had been modified for psychic ability, a power that she had demonstrated to have a firm control over. She had spent most of her life locked up in the lab that had created her, before the project had been terminated, and with it almost Susan herself. She had survived only thanks to the intervention of Doctor Miranda Pauli, a psychologist hired by the secret section to monitor the Augment's mental health. Dr Pauli had become deeply attached to Susan, had begun to consider the child her own daughter, and when she discovered what her creators intended for her she had risked everything to get Susan away from Earth.

Her creators had not given up on them easily. They had the Orion Syndicate put a bounty on their heads, attracting the attention of every bounty hunter in the galaxy. Susan and Miranda had only survived because fate had brought them to Mansfield space station, where Alex and Kana had been meeting an old acquaintance. With the Nains' help they had been able to escape the Orion hunters and make it safely to the _Starship Endeavour_.

Afterwards, Kana had paid a little visit to the Syndicate boss and convinced her to retract the bounties, before she had confronted Mister Black, the man who had issued the contracts in the first place.

The upshot of that meeting was still a mystery to Alex. She had been resting in deep unconsciousness when Kana had borrowed her body for those errands, and the other her was characteristically reticent to discuss what she had done. All she had was Kana's assurance that the matter was taken care of.

Which was enough.

The _Endeavour_ was now back at Earth, undergoing repairs after its action with the Vyar. The majority of the crew was on leave, specialists from Spacedock handling the repair work, and Alex had decided that this free time should be used to treat Susan. She had never had a normal childhood, and Alex wanted to give her one, at least for a little while.

Miranda had been less enthralled with the idea, and she obviously still wasn't happy. Alex smiled at her. "You're all fidgety."

"I think this was a bad idea."

"Finally, someone who agrees with me!" 

"It mightn't be safe. There might still be people looking for us."

Kana looked disgusted again. _"Okay, that wasn't what I was thinking. Alex, you did explain to her that the contracts have been withdrawn?"_

"_Yup. I don't know how much listening she did, though."_

"We're fine," she reassured aloud. "There are four of us keeping an eye on Susan. Nothing will happen."

The fourth she referred to was not Kana, as she had told none of her friends about the entity that dwelled within her, but Miho Inogashira, the ship's head of security. The Japanese woman was a couple of years older than Alex, already in her thirties, but she retained a youthful appearance and quickness. There was no one faster on their feet on the starship, and even the excited, over-energised Susan couldn't get away from her.

Alex also knew that, although she appeared graceful and delicate, Inogashira was a fearsome warrior. Alex had been present when the security chief had broken up a minor riot on Starbase Two. Most of the rioters had had to be taken to the infirmary. Even Kana had been impressed.

No one was going to grab Susan while Inogashira was around.

Of course, Susan knew all of their fears as well as they did. She was constantly scanning with her telepathy, an act for her as natural as breathing. She knew all of their thoughts. At first, it had troubled Alex and her shipmates that the child could be privy to their innermost thoughts and desires, but Susan had always been delicate, she never betrayed secrets (even Alex's big one, which she had known about since before they had met, somehow) and over the last couple of months they had got quite used to her. Few people even thought of her as strange anymore.

"Runaway train!" Exclaimed Susan, leaping higher than ever, jabbing a finger in the direction of the fake mountain that rose out of the winter fog. "Let's go on that, let's go on that!"

Sarn raised an eyebrow. "Runaway train?"

"It's the name of the ride. Come on, you'll love it," promised Alex, her enthusiasm getting into high gear. "High speed that crushes you into your seat, and sharp turns that threaten to throw you out of it, artificial cave roofs skimming by just above your head at seemingly hundreds of kilometres an hour!"

The other eyebrow went up to join the first. "I see. What is enjoyable about that?"

"Beats me. It just is."

Visiting the theme park in winter, not the most traditional of times, had the great advantage of keeping the lines short, and within a few minutes the shipmates had reached the mock Wild West station into which the cars pulled up. Susan, Miranda and Inogashira crowded into the front car, and Sarn was set to follow them until Alex took her hand and led her down to the cars further back. As they slid into their seats, Alex told the Vulcan, "It's faster back here."

Sarn understood that. She had seen part of the course the train took when they had been in the line. The train was often moving quite slowly as it approached corners and drops, only to accelerate after it had reached them. Those further back in the train would be going faster when they met those sharp turns, and obviously that was the experience that Alex wanted. For her part, Sarn was content to sit next the helmsman and hold onto the safety harness.

The train shot out of the station abruptly, and next to her Alex whooped for joy at a volume that was most painful to the Vulcan's sensitive ears. She seemed to realise her gaffe, for Alex turned her head as best she could with the train racing along, and smiled apologetically. Sarn wondered when she had become so adept at reading all the different emotions that Alex could convey with a simple smile. It was a necessary skill, she informed herself. The helmsman spent so little time not smiling that it was essential to be able to read her smiles if one was to gauge her mind.

Why was it necessary to do that, though?

The ride dived through the mouth of a fibreglass cave and started to crank slowly upward. The sides of the tunnel were made to look something like rock and were spray painted brown, with yellow lights set into them and twinkling – presumably gold. The sounds of the cars being winched up clattered around the enclosed space.

Alex was glancing at her again. "Sorry. This must be very painful for you."

"I have endured worse."

"Wait until we get to the top. Then the real fun begins!" Her grin was manic now, her red eyes shining. Something in Sarn responded and smiled as well, but she was sure to keep the expression from her face.

Maybe her parents had been right. Maybe she did need more training in emotional control.

She heard the forward cars go plunging over the edge and her heart started to race. Definitely needed more emotional control! A glance out of the corner of her eyes showed her the almost demented excitement in Alex. Not for the first time, she wondered what went on in the human's head.

Then their car reached the top of the 'mine shaft' and plunged down the twisting, curving, twirling track, leaving Sarn's stomach and her logic at the top. She loved every second of it.

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Captain William Drake was also making the most of his leave time. Alex had invited him to join her on her day out, but he had declined for two reasons: he didn't think it would be seemly for a Starfleet captain (one who had made a name for himself during the Romulan War, and was consequently quite recognisable) to be seen on roller coasters, and he had a very important matter to take care of. It was twenty-three days until Christmas and he had a present to get. Plenty of time, his civilian friends had told him, but he reminded them that, as a Starfleet captain, he might be on Earth one day and on the other side of the cosmos the next. Today, he could get at shops, good shops, and he wasn't going to let the opportunity slip him by.

He had a very special gift to buy for a very special lady.

Initially, he had considered asking Alex to come with him, but even before he had heard of her plans he had rejected that idea, for while Alex was undeniably of the female gender, a lady she definitely was not. She didn't like jewellery, the only makeup she wore was black lipstick, she thought dresses were silly, and her idea of a good time was to imbue large quantities of alcohol and wake up with someone she barely knew. She was his best friend and he treasured her, but he often thought he understood the female mind far better than she did.

Lieutenant Max Walker strolled along with him, glancing into windows every now and then. From time to time, he would stop and deeply inhale the crisp winter air, and every time it brought a smile to his face. Drake understood. He remembered when he had been a young officer, how he would look forward to getting off the ship, how he would savour the clean air of a planet. These days he had spent so much time in space that the sanitised, slightly musky recycled air of a starship felt better on his lungs. When he had beamed down to Earth this morning he had had to take a pocket full of tissues.

He had just about got over the sneezing now, but every so often they would pass a new smell that would set him off again. It was a common problem for people who spent too long in space; the body got so used to sterile air that the pollen and pollutants in planetary air caused an immune response. Spaceman's hay fever, it was called. Drake had had it before. He knew that it would clear up in a day or two.

In his experience, Alex never suffered from it. She was lucky like that. She didn't get sick very often, and when she did, she recovered quickly. Good immune system, he supposed. His own was a little weaker than he would have liked. He had always been susceptible to colds and the like. If there had been a bug going around school, he was guaranteed to get it and get it bad. As an adult, things hadn't much improved.

Starships were definitely better for him than planets.

"It's good to be in the fresh air again," said Walker. "The ship was getting stuffy."

Drake dabbed his dribbling nose with a tissue. "Uh-huh."

"Sorry, sir."

"No, no. You're right; it is nice to be outdoors. I'll appreciate it even more when I get over the hay fever."

"You didn't go on any of the landing parties in August, did you, sir?"

"To the planet where we found that statue? No. The shuttles were always full. You science guys had all the fun."

"It was a great expedition."

Drake didn't remember it quite that way. Admiral McCaffrey, commanding officer of Starbase Two and the ships attached to it, including the _Endeavour_, had sent them to explore a newly discovered M-class planet on the fringe of his sector. It had been pointless make work, an excuse to get the _Endeavour_ away from the real action, the simmering tension along the Klingon border. McCaffrey hadn't liked Drake since the two men had served together on _Kyoto_, at the beginning of the captain's career.

For days they had sat in orbit above a planet that looked very much like every other Earthy world Drake had ever seen, sending down team after team to poke around other bits of it. They had made some interesting discoveries: Sarn had found some crystals with unusual subspace properties, and the archaeologists had learnt a lot about the Roman-age people who had once inhabited that world, but Drake still considered the whole exercise to have been a waste of time.

Except for one little detail that was truly interesting, even to him, a military man. In one of the ruined cities the scientists had discovered a statue, a depiction of two women, one strong and noble, the other dark and cruel. The same woman, but two different versions of her. The same woman with spiky hair, a cloak, and a very familiar face: Alex.

Although the science teams had worked on it, they had no real explanation for that statue. It was genuine, they knew that much – it had been carved more than three thousand years ago, at the height of that civilisation's power. How Alex came to be its subject…theories ranged. Maybe time travel was involved. Maybe there had been a doppelganger living on that world – they still didn't know what those people had looked like, although it was assumed they were humanoid. The second theory was the more widely accepted, simply because no one much liked the idea of time travel.

Oddly, and Drake really did think this was strange, Alex didn't seem to care. Where the statue had come from and what it might mean for her destiny – if such a trite word could be appropriate – didn't matter to her. She kept saying that, whatever came, she would deal with it in her own time, and then she changed the conversation. Was she really worried and hiding her fear? Did she not understand? Did she know something that they didn't? Alex was brilliant at talking a lot and saying nothing. It frustrated Drake that he didn't know his friend's mind about this.

There was something else about the statue that nagged him. The darker Alex figure…he was sure that he should understand that. Some of the more philosophical members of the crew had suggested that it depicted the capacity for evil that lurked within the hearts of every person. But it was more than that. Somehow, he knew it was. Something deep in his memory was trying to tell him something.

As usual it wouldn't come, and Drake put it out of his head. He was here to get a gift for Annabelle, not to worry about Alex.

"What are you thinking of, Captain? For a present, I mean."

"Last time I saw Annabelle in the flesh, she was talking about jewellery. A nice necklace, I think. Something along those lines is what I'm thinking."

Max chuckled. "Now I see why you didn't ask Alex."

The captain gave him a look. "What does that mean?"

"Well…" he felt like he had been put on the spot, and he wished he had kept his mouth shut. "Everyone knows how close you two are. I was surprised when you asked me to come with you. But that sort of thing…Alex isn't really into…girly things, is she?"

"No," Drake smiled. "No, she's not. All the female officers went with her to that theme park."

"Except for Tholiar."

"True. But I'm buying for a human female. Andorians have different tastes." There was also the issue that, while he knew Tholiar perfectly as a first officer, he hardly knew her at all as a person. He skimmed over that, continuing, "Besides, you're a married man, Max, so you must have gone through all this at one point."

The science officer was one of that very rare breed of Starfleet officer who had managed to sustain both a career and a healthy married life – even through the darkness of the Romulan War, when he had been stationed aboard Earth Base Three as a sensor operator, his wife on Earth, and more than a year had gone by between their seeing each other at all; visual subspace communications had been as much an impossibility as being face to face. He was only the second married officer Drake had ever served with, the first being the tactical officer of his wartime posting, _Challenger_.

Unlike Helen Morrison, Max had recently surrendered to the immense difficulties of maintaining a marriage across the light years. Since he wasn't willing to give up his wife for his career (and Drake, having met the lovely Katherine, could not blame him) and Starfleet did not provide for families aboard starships, he was left with only one choice.

"Sure," he laughed. "Gifts to show you care. Christmas and birthdays are the worst, aren't they? I mean, you've got to get a really good present then, better than the other little ones you've got her during the year; otherwise it looks like you're not trying. Believe me; I fell into that trap once. Took me a year to get out of it."

Annabelle DeCroix was a science officer on the Federation research ship _Von Braun_. She was beautiful, charming and intelligent, and more than one man had been pursuing her when Drake had met her at a Starfleet party. It had, as the old cliché went, been love at first sight, as the two major flaws with Annabelle demonstrated: she was a scientist, and she couldn't stand Alex Nain. Usually, either was enough to kill a romantic relationship stone dead, but with Annabelle, Drake was able to look past them.

Walker took the lead and showed his captain into _Spencer's_, a nice little jewellery shop off the main high street. This was where he had got both his engagement and his wedding ring, he announced, and the elderly man behind the counter recognised him. They talked casually while Drake browsed the shiny chains on offer. Walker was also doing his Christmas shopping. He had bought his wife a new portable computer for her work, and now he was looking for something for his son, who was about Susan's age. Walker had married young, when he was still nineteen. Drake, personally, thought that was far too young to be starting a family. Before he had even lived, Max had been bringing new life into the world. That didn't seem right to him.

Maybe he just thought that because he was nearly forty now, and a bit of him worried that he might have waited too long. He could feel himself slowing down, his strength beginning to fade. When his kid wanted to play ball, would he be able to? Would he have the stamina to show the boy (or girl, he wasn't fussy) how to ride a bike, or swim, or play football? Would he be able to be a decent father?

While he was looking at the jewellery he thought about his earlier little outburst at Walker. It shouldn't have happened, and he cursed himself for it. He was too sensitive about Alex, and always had been. He suspected that was part of the reason Annabelle didn't like her, she saw Alex as competition. He understood why. The two of them had always been closer than just friends. He often found that his thoughts strayed to her; he knew that there were rumours about their relationship circling the ship, despite his best efforts to have them stamped out.

He told himself over and over that he had no interest in Alex as anything but a friend, and yet when he looked at his own actions he wondered if that was a lie. How often had he fretted when she had been away? Pacing up and down his cabin, around the ship, full of nerves…

No, he was being ridiculous. He loved Annabelle, end of story. And…even if he did love Alex – love her in _that_ way – he knew it was hopeless. The age difference wasn't the problem; it was something more fundamental than that. Alex didn't know how to love. She knew how to care and how to make love, but when it came to devoting herself utterly to someone else…that wasn't possible for her.

Sad, really.

Something else that he found sad was that the end of this year would also see the end of his association with two _Endeavour_ officers. Max Walker and Doctor Richard Ilerson were both leaving the ship in the New Year – Max to begin his new teaching job and be closer to his young family, and Ilerson moving back to Starfleet Medical. He would haven to find replacements for the two men before long. He had a list of candidates that he was slowly going through, waiting for the perfect personnel to leap out of the page at him. For the doctor, he doubted that that would ever happen. Ilerson was just the ideal starship doctor: patient, creative, and able to work medical miracles with nothing more than a few bandages and some aspirin. Every ship in the fleet wanted him, and Drake had been damned lucky to secure his services for as long as he had.

As a replacement science officer, he had one candidate in particular in mind. In an ideal world there would have been two, but he knew that Annabelle would not want to serve aboard a military ship, and that she probably wouldn't be a good choice for the post anyway – she was a researcher, first and foremost; leading a department would be a nightmare for her. But he had in mind someone who would be perfect for the job on _Endeavour_. He would approach her just as soon as Walker had left the ship and the post was officially open.

The perfect present sparkled invitingly on a tray. In his mind, he could see Annabelle wearing it, along with that stunning black satin dress she had worn on their last dinner date. Was there ever a more beautiful image?

"I'll take that," he said, pointing.

While the storekeeper wrapped up the box for him, Drake's mind was anticipating Annabelle's delight. He would get to see her again, soon, he knew. The _Von Braun_ returned to Earth on the fifteenth. Come Hell or high water, he would be there when that ship made port. They would spend Christmas and New Year's together.

If there was a better way to see out 2164, he couldn't imagine it.

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They had taken a break for lunch; unhealthy food from one of the burger bars; it had been Susan's choice. Sarn and Inogashira had eaten veggie burgers, but the other women were carnivorous. The adults had opted for coffee with their meals, except for Alex, who had joined Susan in fizzy soda. Which had been a mistake. She had no table manners, and the soda had made her burp, a lot. Susan had found it very funny, but the women had not been impressed, even though they well knew Alex's reputation as a ladette.

Out in the cool air again, letting their meals settle before they tackled another ride, Sarn walked with the helmsmen. The others were further ahead, trying to keep Susan from running off and making herself sick.

"Why do you behave like that?"

"Like what?"

"The way you do," said Sarn, very unspecifically. "It is not dignified."

Alex shrugged her narrow shoulders. "Like I care. Oh, Sarn, don't take it that way. I didn't mean to upset you. I've just never really cared what people thought of me. Love me, don't, it doesn't bother me." She laughed. "If that sort of stuff mattered to me, would I dress the way I do? Nah, I'd be all boring and ordinary. Be part of the crowd and no one makes fun of you, but no one notices you either."

"So you act as you do to stand out?"

She contemplated that for a second. "Sort of. And I've never liked girly things, anyway. All soft and sweet and…bleugh!" For a moment she looked quite sad and she added quietly, "Maybe they're okay if you've got time to be soft and sweet."

Sarn found that comment curious. "What do you mean?"

Alex shrugged, but she was not yet back to her regular self. For the first time, Sarn noticed that beneath all the cheer in her eyes there was a cool hardness. She wondered where that came from.

The human ignored her question and continued, "Besides, if you've gotta burp you've gotta burp. It's illogical not too, right? Your body wouldn't do it if there wasn't some point."

"The same could be said of emotions, Alex. Yet my people suppress them."

"That's a necessity. If you didn't you would be blood-drenched savages, barely more than animals, for all of your intellect." The warmth was gone from Alex's voice; it too was cold and hard. She noticed and smiled, the cheer returning to her. "Sorry. That was rude, wasn't it? I'm very sorry."

"It was an accurate observation," said Sarn carefully.

Alex shook her head. "Shouldn't have been made. I'm a rude girl, yes, but there's belching at table rude and then there's rude, and that was rude. Forgive me?"

"Of course."

The helmsman was obviously relieved, and she patted Sarn affectionately on the shoulder. As a rule, Vulcans did not like to be touched. The low-level psychic fields that surrounded them often made physical contact uncomfortable. In this case, however, Sarn did not object.

Kana had observed the conversation silently, but now she spoke. _"She touched on a sore spot there, didn't she?"_

"_It wasn't her fault. She doesn't know."_

"_I'm curious. Do you really wish things had been different? Do you wish you could have grown up with dolls and pink wallpaper?"_

"_Hell no." _Her metal voice sounded ill._ "And I don't think it would have made any difference if I had; I'd still be me. But…well…it might have been nice to…"_

"_Have a family?"_ Offered Kana.

Alex wished that she could show her other side the fondness that she felt in her heart, but Sarn would see and she wouldn't understand. _"I've always had a family."_

"_You know what I mean."_

"_And you know what I mean. A couple more people in my life… Really, what difference would it have made?"_

Kana didn't say anything. Alex's real feelings were often as much a mystery to her as they were to Sarn. If her lost family mattered to her, Kana couldn't tell, and didn't want to risk making a wrong guess.

A man approached Alex and her friend. He was a little younger than she, in his early twenties, and he was obviously keen on her; his wandering sapphire eyes gave all away. Even with her cloak drawn around her against the cold, Alex was a pretty sight. She would never win any beauty pageants, but most real women wouldn't.

He started talking to her, ignoring Sarn more completely than one might ignore a dog. It wasn't that he found the Vulcan unattractive – anyone with eyes could tell that she was a stunning example of the female form – it was that she was Vulcan, and he, like too many on Earth, was prejudiced against non-humans. She could have been naked, oiled, and begging for him and he would have looked straight through her.

The man repulsed Alex. Not because he was unattractive – he wasn't – but because of his attitude towards Sarn. She hated prejudice. She prided herself on having only one prejudice, and that was against prejudiced people, like him. His presence, so close to her, almost touching, sickened her. That he hoped to get closer to her made her angry indeed.

She wished that a male crewmember had accompanied them. Will, preferably. Or Brok – as much as she teased that oaf of a Bolian, she loved him. She wished that Miho were nearer, able to come to her rescue. The Japanese woman would have drawn the man off nicely – she was better looking, and Alex wouldn't refute that. She wished that she could let Kana emerge, let her other soul handle this mindless fool. She wished…

She was suddenly aware of someone kissing her. For a horrible instant, she thought that the man had been too forward, but she quickly realised her mistake. Warm, smooth skin pressed against her lips, and she felt her flesh tingle slightly. Not in the way that pleasure made her tingle, but her nerve endings responding to the actions of a weak psychic energy field.

Sarn!

Good solution thought, Alex, noticing the way the man was backing up. Almost any other woman, she was sure, and he would have been hugely aroused; but because it was Sarn, a Vulcan, he was repelled. Good! She kissed Sarn more heartily. She had a little experience with this sort of thing, a few drunken fumbles, a couple of flings where both she and the other woman were solely interested in fulfilling carnal desires, but this was quite different. Sarn was surprisingly tender for a supposedly emotionless creature. Alex closed her eyes and lost herself in the kiss.

It was Sarn who broke it off, and Alex found herself oddly disappointed – why had such a perfect kiss had to come to an end? But she turned with Sarn to face the racist man, wrapping an arm around the Vulcan's slim waist and pulling her closer. Sarn held out her hand to Alex, index and middle finger extended, the rest balled into a fist. Alex recognised the gesture as one intimate Vulcans made. She copied and touched her fingers against Sarn's.

"We are happy with each other," the Vulcan said to the man.

He was stepping back, looking appalled. Inside her mind, Alex was roaring with laughter. "You…you two…?"

"You wouldn't believe what she's like under the sheets," said Alex with a big grin, tracing Sarn's hip with her index finger.

That was more than he had wanted to hear, and he departed hastily, pausing only when he was a long way off to shout back, "You two are sick!"

Kana laughed throatily. _"What a way to deal with that bigoted fool! I'm impressed by Sarn's quick thinking. And her snideness. Who would have thought she had it in her?"_ She suddenly noticed that Alex wasn't saying anything, and that she hadn't yet let go of the Vulcan; not that Sarn was complaining. A new interpretation came to mind. _"Or was it snideness? Our Vulcan friend has always been quite drawn to you. And what of her mate back home? Vulcan children are partnered off at birth, and yet she has never mentioned one." _She chuckled. _"Amusing. Could it be that she has…wayward tendencies?"_

Alex wasn't listening. "That was…a hell of a kiss."

"I am sorry if I disturbed you."

"Hell no," laughed Alex, holding Sarn's dark intelligent eyes in hers. "Like I said, it was a great kiss. And a great idea. Got rid of that bloody moron. Good thing, too. That guy was such a wanker, and if you hadn't leapt in I would have hit him."

"For what reason?"

"I didn't like him coming onto me. Especially with the way he was treating you. Bigot. I can't stand that sort of thing, Sarn."

"Perhaps he thought you were more attractive than I."

Alex laughed at that. "Nah. The only reason he wasn't chasing you is you've got pointy ears and green blood. You're much more beautiful than me. I think you're gorgeous."

"_Careful, Alex. Don't get her hopes up. That's just mean."_

Alex still didn't listen. She realised that they had been standing around for some time, and that the others would be far ahead of them by now. She grinned at her favourite Vulcan. "Come on. We should catch up with the others."

"Yes." Sarn looked at Alex's arm. She had moved it up a bit now, so that it was around her stomach, but she hadn't let go. Alex noticed her gaze and said, "Want me to move it? It's just I was thinking, if that guy comes back, or anyone else tries it, this would be easier. Keep them away."

"Logical," said Sarn. Whatever her true feelings were, for once she was able to keep them perfectly hidden, even from herself.

Kana gave her host a curious stare. _"I didn't know you were into that sort of thing."_

"_Neither did I."_

When they caught up with the rest of their party they were in the line for the haunted house ride. Susan was the first to notice their approach, of course, turning around sharply as they walked up. There was a knowing light in the girl's eyes, and Alex was reminded that although she was young she had knowledge and experience of things far beyond her years. She probably understood what had passed between she and Sarn better than either of them did.

Miho grinned at the two of them. "You're acting very friendly."

Sarn looked like she might step away, but Alex wouldn't let her. "Young love," she said, with a smile that added she might or might not be serious. The security chief didn't seem perturbed or surprised, but Miranda obviously didn't approve, even if the helmsman was just joking around.

"You make a lovely couple," said Miho. "I think you've finally made a good choice, Alex. Sarn'll be good for you. Help you grow up a bit."

Susan laughed hysterically. "No! She'll make a kid out of Sarn."

"I think they're insulting me."

There was an amused twinkle in Sarn's eyes now. "I think their observations are valid."

"Keep that up, my love," warned Alex, "and you'll be sleeping on the couch tonight."

Miranda was the only one who didn't at least laugh in her heart.


	2. Chapter 2

**_Chapter Two_**

"How was the park?"

Alex accepted the glass of decent Scotch whisky – five-year-old double malt – her friend had poured for her and took a sip. Wonderfully warm after the cold day, and she savoured it. It would have been even welcomer if she hadn't spent most of the day cuddled up against Sarn, sharing her warmth. She smiled at the thought. "A lot of fun. We went on some great rides. I think Susan had a really great time."

"She certainly seemed happy," Drake agreed. He sipped his whisky and continued in a different tone, "I had a complaint, though. From Miranda. About you."

Higher rank didn't afford one much better quarters on a Daedalus-class starship; all officers were berthed on deck five of the spherical hull, and the captain's cabin was only marginally more spacious than Alex's. It had the same little working area adjacent to the door, with a desk and computer terminal; the bathroom door was on the left as you faced the desk, and on the right was a flimsy partition and then the captain's bunk, single comfortable chair, and bookcase of old-fashioned leather-bound tomes. The captain was leaning against his desk, the whisky bottle sat on it; Alex was helping to prop up the doorway.

Until now she had been speaking largely to her drink, but she looked up, her red eyes perplexed. "Huh? If this is about that bloody lunch again…"

Drake set his drink aside and watched her, knowing full well about Alex's short and volatile temper. He spoke carefully. "It's not, although that got a mention. Look, I don't know how to say this sensitively, so I'm just going to say it. Miranda thinks you're a bad influence on Susan."

Alex's eyes widened. "Me?"

He nodded. "You."

"Why? What have I ever done?"

"Apart from the burping, swearing, drunkenness, debauchery, and fighting?" Suggested Drake.

"Ah. Well, yeah…apart from that lot."

He sat on his bunk, rather than behind his desk, so that this would seem less like a formal dressing down. At the moment Alex looked wounded, but he knew how quickly her mood could swing over to anger; and when that cold fury seeped into her she was so dangerous. He didn't want to provoke her, wanted her to understand that this was just an airing of a grievance passed on to him, not a disciplinary action. "This has been a long time in coming, Alex. Remember, Susan can read minds. Miranda's worried that she'll pick up all sorts of bad habits from you. Don't take this the wrong way, but – "

That was the wrong thing to say. Alex's eyes, so often shining with glee, hardened into ice. How could eyes that were red, a colour associated with heat, project such terrible coldness? "You can see what she means."

The captain shrugged.

"That's all fine by me," said Alex, a bit calmer, a bit warmer. "I just wish she had waited until tomorrow. It's spoilt a really good day."

Drake really didn't want to say the next part. He was as delicate as he could be. "I think today was part of the problem."

Alex didn't understand what he meant, or what Miranda could be complaining about. "What? Susan had a great time! First time she's ever lived!"

"I know. It was your behaviour. With Sarn. Even if you were playing, Miranda doesn't want Susan exposed to that sort of thing."

Ice, again – her mood really was fragile today. "What? She's worried it's catching? That's homophobic shit." The woman hesitated a moment, her temper subsiding again, and she admitted in a quiet voice, "Besides, I wasn't playing."

Drake's eyes widened. There was something that he had not expected to hear, and he was as stunned by it as Alex had been of Miranda's complaint. "You and Sarn?" If she had said one of the male officers, Fran, navigator Cartwright, even the Bolian Brok, he wouldn't have been so surprised, but a _female_ _Vulcan_? He suddenly wasn't sure which part surprised him more, the gender or the species. Of everyone on the crew, the last person he would have expected the overly-emotional Alex to be drawn to was a Vulcan.

"I think so," said Alex, although she sounded very uncertain. "I don't know. I've felt…something for her for a while. Couldn't place it, you know? But she kissed me today and…"

"She kissed you?"

Alex told him the story and noticed how he didn't laugh. He would have, if she had mentioned that part first – he would have found it hilarious. Now, he was more focused on her confused feelings.

"It was really weird," she said, struggling to express her thoughts eloquently. "I never thought…and then she…and I just didn't want her to stop. It's…I honestly don't know. I suck at this stuff, Will. I've always tried to avoid that sort of really deep, really meaningful relationship. I've had a few come close before, and I've always broken them off. I just don't know how to deal with that kind of intimacy. This time…it just kinda snuck up on me. Caught me unawares. Now, I don't know what to do. Even what I really feel."

It occurred to Drake that there was a very important, fundamental question that needed answering here. "Do you love her?"

Alex swirled her glass, as though the answer would emerge from the whisky if she just mixed it hard enough.

"I don't know. It was a hell of a kiss, and she's so sexy. Maybe that's all there is to it. I've…well…you know." She sighed. "But I try and tell myself that and I can't quite believe it. I keep looking back at all the time I've spent with her and reinterpreting it. Maybe this has been going on for a long time and I just haven't noticed until now."

"Maybe," he said neutrally.

"I'm attracted to her, certainly," mused Alex aloud. "I know I'm bi-sexual. I've had a few flings with other girls. Back when we were on _Challenger_ I had an affair with Helen that lasted years."

Drake had never heard that one, even drifting around _Challenger_'s active rumour mill. There had been gossip that the married armoury officer had been engaging the services of someone on the crew to cope with the absence of her husband, but Alex's name had never been linked to hers.

"Helen? Helen Morrison? I thought she was married?"

A gamer's grin flashed over Alex's lips. "Still is. Two kids. That's what made it an affair, Will," she had that cheeky cheer in her eyes.

Drake said, "I didn't know about that. Rumour was you were with Coltrane."

"I was. When Helen wasn't around." She wasn't about to let herself be distracted, tempting as it was. She continued her earlier thought, "So I've got some experience being with women. And Sarn's _gorgeous_. She should be out winning beauty pageants. There's something about her, though… Attraction I can deal with okay, I'm used to it. It's these other…feelings I've got." She sighed again. "Other thing is, I'm not even sure how Sarn feels. I can read her pretty well about most things, but this…nah."

"Ask her."

The most obvious – and most useless – suggestion in the cosmos, and Alex treated it as such, shrugging it off. "I would. Except…if she's not interested…it's not something I want to risk right now, Will. Whatever else, I want her as my friend."

He understood that. Alex valued friendship above just about anything else. He thought it was necessary to point out, "She wouldn't have kissed you if she didn't feel something for you."

"I guess…" she sighed again and played with her thin hands, nervous and fidgety. "I need your help with this, Will. I really, honestly don't know what to do. This is all alien to me. You've been in love. Hell, you're in love now. With Annabelle. You can give me advice."

He suddenly felt very uncomfortable. Alex had never asked him for help with anything before, and now that she did he felt himself completely unprepared, and unable. "I'm not sure, Alex. I…I don't know much about…what you're talking about." Damn, he sounded so weak. Pathetic. A captain shouldn't sound so infirm.

"You're in love with a woman, I might be in love with a woman; it's the same thing really."

How simple she made it sound when she phrased it like that, he thought. She was ignoring all of the pretty major differences between him and his beloved, and she and Sarn.

Besides…he wasn't even sure that he approved of that sort of relationship.

Ridiculous, he told himself a moment later. Whether he approved or not was not the issue. Alex's happiness was what was important, and if her happiness lay with Sarn then he should encourage that. She wanted his help working through her feelings, not his opinion on whether homosexuality was morally right.

He finished his whisky and decided that he was going to need a second. "I'll do what I can. I'm not sure how much help I will be though, Alex."

She didn't let that worry her. "Whatever you can, Will. You know more about this stuff than I do." She deposited her empty glass on the table and patted down her clothes, her odd little mind leaping to another topic entirely. "Right, I've taken up enough of your valuable time."

"Where are you going?"

"Manchester, in fact. Got some business to take care of."

He knew better than to ask any more than that.

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Manchester City, England, was an old industrial city, poor in parts, very poor in others. It was to these later quarters that Alex Nain made her way, after landing the _Shadow Wing_ at London spaceport and taking the travel pod up north. It was even colder up here than it had been at the theme park, and it was later in the day. She had left her cloak in her small stealth ship, and in its place she wore a very thick, very heavy coat that reached all the way down to her feet. It was of a conventional cut and made from fine Andorian _ketia_ fur. It had been a gift, years ago, from an Andorian trader whom she had rescued from Klingon attack. That it still fit showed only how little she had grown since her teenage years.

Fine white snow lay sprinkled on the ground, crunching underfoot in a way that irritated her ears. She had never liked the sound of boots stepping on snow, ever since she was a child. There was no real reason for it, just as there was no particular reason why she found the colour yellow distasteful, it was just one of her quirks.

Thinking of quirks made her self-reflective. She had looked at herself in the mirror on the way down from the _Endeavour_. There was nothing special about her. She wasn't ugly but no one would be knocking on her door begging her to do a centrefold any time soon. Her body was healthy and toned, her legs were long and shapely but she didn't have any breasts to speak of. Her face wasn't ugly, her smile was particularly beautiful, but red eyes weren't known for their beauty. What did Sarn see in her? What had any of the others who had courted her in the past seen in her?

She knew what some of the men had liked about her. She was a bit of rough, she hadn't wanted to waste time with any of that slowly-slowly romance crap; she had been all about carnal pleasures. That had certainly got her noticed. But what about Sarn? She was a classy woman. What did she see in her?

Alex couldn't think of anything.

"_You're so introspective today."_

She smiled sadly at Kana. _"Lots on my mind."_

"_No, I don't think so. There's just one thing on your mind, isn't there?"_

Trying to hide things from her counterpart was an impossibility for her; and yet, Kana was so very good at keeping her own secrets. Just one of those little differences between us, Alex thought, indulging in a moment of distraction before her thoughts refocused on her problem.

"_Okay. That's true. I suppose I should ask you your opinion."_

The other Nain shook her head and told her, _"You don't have to, Alex. Just because we live in one another doesn't mean you have to consult with me about everything. It is your life, after all. Anyway, I'm not sure how useful my advice would be. The last romantic relationship I indulged in was…well; it was a very long time before I met you, at any rate."_

"_Tell me about it?"_

Kana hadn't been going to, but now that Alex asked she couldn't fairly say no. _"All right. It was a very, very long time ago. During my mortality, in fact."_

"_Your mortality?"_

"_Before my species transcended to exist as energy…Dark Souls, if you will. We were once creatures of flesh and blood, not very unlike your species, Alex. But, getting back to my story. I was an officer in our armed forces. He was a superior officer in our armed forces, and I wanted promotion. That's how it began, anyway. I started to develop real feeling for the man, the more time we spent together."_

Kana, in love? That kind of love? It sounded deliciously absurd to Alex Nain. She knew that her counterpart loved her dearly, but she could not imagine her other soul as a devoted wife; no more than she could imagine herself in the position.

Would Sarn want to get joined to me? She wondered. If we had that sort of relationship, would she want me to say some vows? And would I?

"_What happened? Did you…?"_

"_Live happily ever after?"_ Kana laughed. _"No. He died."_

Alex made a guess: _"In that war you told me about__?"_

She shook her head. _"No. That was a long time later. He didn't even make it to ascension."_

Although she was quite sure that she shouldn't, her curiosity inspired her to ask, _"What happened, then?"_

"_There was a civil war, and he picked the wrong side."_

She didn't ask this time. When would she learn not to quiz Kana about her ancient past? None of the stories she told ever had a happy ending.

Kana wasn't upset at all recounting that story to Alex. The past was in the past, untouchable, unchangeable, unimportant in everything other than that it had led to the present. Some yearned to live in the past – their own or the historical past – but not her. Although she had lived for eons, the brief couple of decades with Alex were the happiest of her time. She wouldn't trade them for anything.

"_Returning to the original topic, I can't really help you with this, Alex. Neither can Will. Normally, as you know, I love to interfere and spread my wicked influence. But in matters of the heart, I think it's best that you make your own decisions. First, work out how you feel about her, then tell her."_

"_Thanks."_

"_Make sure you do it in that order, though,"_ Kana warned. _"Don't tell Sarn that you love her, only to find out you don't. That's not fair to her, and it will ruin things for you."_

"_You can be really sweet when you want to be."_

"_Sweet as chocolate,"_ agreed Kana. _"Speaking of, I think I've earned some from all this."_

"_No question. Soon as we get near a shop."_

That wouldn't be for some time, as Kana well knew. They were in a part of town that was just row after row of ancient houses; tiny little homes, a kitchen and living room downstairs, a bedroom and bathroom above. Alex had briefly lived in a house such as these, when she had been with her first foster family. Kind people. She remembered them fondly.

She stopped at a specific door and tapped her knuckles against the bare wood. From inside, she could hear the sounds of a body rushing down the stairs. Locks were pulled back and the door nudged open a crack so that the owner could peer out.

"Hello Mark."

"Alex." He threw open the door and she stepped in quickly, before too much heat could escape. "What are…I hadn't expected to see you."

"Sorry, I know I should have called ahead, but I wanted to surprise you."

"You know how I love surprises," he said warmly. "You must be freezing, although I'm glad to see you've dressed for the weather this time. I remember last time you came, and it was pouring with rain, and you were wearing that silly cloak of yours. Didn't even have an umbrella."

"I left it on my seat in the shuttle," she laughed. "You know how careless I can get."

"Sure do. Although, I'm surprised Kana couldn't whip up a force field or something to keep the rain off you."

"She was too busy laughing at me for being so stupid."

He helped her out of her coat and hung it over the tatty banister rail, its mauve paint flaking from the wood. "Come into the living room, make yourself comfortable. Cup of tea?"

"Love one." She took a place on his small, old sofa. "It's been ages since I've had a decent cuppa. Most of my friends on the ship are alien or foreigners."

"Ah. Can't make good tea."

"Not for love nor money."

He returned to the small, sad room a few minutes later, carrying a tray with two cracked china cups of tea on it and a couple of slices of Christmas cake on a saucer. Alex sipped the nourishing beverage and sighed happily. "You should join the crew, Mark. Become part of the catering staff. I'd hire you just for the tea."

He chuckled a little, because he was obliged to, but his heart wasn't in it. "You know I can't."

"Times have changed a bit. We're at peace now, and our ships are a lot bigger. We've got room for passengers, diplomats and whatever. There's a child living permanently on the _Endeavour_ right now."

"Really?"

"Sure. I'd have brought her down to meet Charlie, but we took her to a theme park earlier today and she got worn out. Damn. If I'd been thinking straight I would have…"

He shook his head. "It's okay. I wouldn't have been able to afford it, anyway."

"I'd have paid. Damn. Stupid of me."

She had been too excited by the prospect of doing something nice for Susan – who, despite her general dislike of children, she really liked – that she hadn't thought straight. Mark was one of her oldest friends, and she had no excuse for letting him slip her mind.

He wasn't offended. "Don't worry, Alex. I'm just happy to see you at all. I hadn't even known your ship was back in the solar system."

"You've been keeping track of me?" She felt a little flattered by that.

Mark smiled. "You're all Charlie will talk about some days. I have to find out what's going on with you, so I can tell him all the new stories. You've been a bit quiet lately, though. Or has it all been classified stuff?"

"A bit quiet, a bit classified," she said. "You heard about the _Daedalus_ incident?"

He sipped his tea – Earl Grey with a dash of honey; one of his rare treats. "A little. Just that the ship disappeared. You guys helped recover it. That's all that's made it down to civilian levels."

Alex wasn't surprised by that. A Starfleet ship being captured by a new Threat species, in an area of space that had previously been declared entirely safe, wasn't the sort of thing the admiralty liked to admit. Especially with public confidence in the service at its lowest since the Xindi attack of the mid-twenty-two fifties.

"Well, I'll tell Charlie the full story. As long as he doesn't spread it around."

Mark turned very sad. "I, uh, I don't think there's much chance of that, Alex."

"He's not…?" The thought was too terrible to utter aloud, even for one as used to death and destruction as Alex Nain.

Her friend shook his head. "No. Still with us. The doctors think he'll see at least one more Christmas, after this one. But he's worse."

"Take me to him," commanded Kana, setting aside her teacup and the piece of cake she had bitten into.

Charlie was upstairs. There was only one bedroom in the house, and it was his; Mark slept on the sofa. It was minimally furnished, Mark not being able to afford much, and what decoration there was followed a theme: pictures of comic book rockets, old photographs of the Apollo missions, the _Phoenix_, the old NX-class starships, and couple of images of Daedalus-class ships. On one, the ship's registry had been crossed out and _U.S.S. Endeavour_ had been scrawled in a childish hand. The ceiling was black and decorated with white dots, arranged into the familiar constellations.

The child who slept uncomfortably, wheezing with each breath, had ever dreamed of reaching the real stars, but the ones on his ceiling were as close as he was ever going to get. If it were possible, Alex would have delighted in taking him into space in her _Shadow Wing_ years ago; Kana, who loved the boy dearly, would have transported him to distant and wondrous corners of the cosmos. But it wasn't possible. Kana had often observed that the human grip on life was fragile, and Charlie Denham's grip was more fragile than most. His body was weak, poorly formed, constantly on the verge of collapse. He was seven years old, and that he had lived as long as he had was a miracle.

A miracle that Kana did her very best to maintain for as long as possible. She knelt down at the boy's side and touched a finger softly against his head. He turned in his sleep, but didn't wake.

"The plaque has built up further, hasn't it?"

The father answered simply: "Yes."

"I can break it down."

"But you can't undo the damage to his brain. Or his lungs. Or his immune system."

Kana shook her head, very honestly miserable. Mark had begged her to do just that, years ago, when she had first revealed herself to him. He couldn't understand why one as powerful as her couldn't mend a human body. She had tried to make him understand that it was so much simpler to destroy than it was to rebuild. She could only help Alex heal her wounds because of their close bond.

She did what she could, her alien energy trickling through Charlie's weak little body, breaking down the plaque that had built up on his brain, the mucus that was in his lungs, wiping away the most dangerous of the bacteria and viruses in his body. He seemed to strengthen, to recover, but she knew it was only temporary. He was fighting against a degenerative condition, and he wasn't going to win.

"That's all I can do."

"Thank you, Kana."

"Don't!" She hissed, only to immediately regret her outburst. She hung her head and sighed. "I didn't mean to snap. This frustrates me immensely. I'm not used to being powerless, Mark."

"I know. You're used to being master of everything."

"Very true." The fire faded from her eyes and Alex faced him again. She very tenderly kissed Charlie on the top of his head. "We'll find a way to help him, Mark."

She meant what she said, but the words still sounded hollow to Mark.

"I appreciate it. But I…I don't think you can. Either of you." He put that miserable, miserable thought out of his mind and tried to be cheerful. "Hey, maybe I should wake him? He'll want to see you."

"No. Look how peaceful he is. Let him sleep."

He was peaceful. It had been a long time since Charlie had slept so quietly, without any pain. Kana couldn't save his life, but she could make it more comfortable for him, and Mark was grateful for that.

They went back down stairs and finished their tea.

"I've been checking the long range forecast. White Christmas this year, they say," said Mark, making small talk. "I hope so. You know how Charlie loves the snow."

"I hope I'll be here to see it."

"You might not be?"

"Starfleet service. Never know where I'm going to be. But," she grinned excitedly, "if we are still at Earth, I'll bring Susan over to visit."

He hadn't heard her mention anyone of that name before. "Susan?"

"She's the child on _Endeavour_. Eight. Perfect, right? She and Charlie can play together."

"I don't know," he chewed his lip. "Charlie's fragile, and he can be a bit…"

Alex knew what he was saying. Charlie's mind was as affected by his illness as his body. "Susan's a sensitive soul. It would be good for her to spend some time with other children, and I think Charlie would enjoy it, too."

She was a charismatic young woman, who could effortlessly convince most people to take her point of view. Mark nodded. "All right. Sounds good to me."

A picture on the wall had caught her attention and she went over to take a look at it: a line of people, smiling at the camera. She recognised Mark, and several of the others with him. Not all of them, and she assumed the new faces were husbands and wives. She looked over her shoulder at Mark. "Reunion?"

"In October. You were out of system, of course."

"Of course. How is everyone?"

"Everyone that came is doing well. The others…" He shook his head terribly sadly. "You remember Moira?"

"Sure. Black hair, blue eyes, always scruffy. Well…scruffier than the rest of us, anyway." She laughed. None of them had been beautiful in those days.

"She's in prison now. Life term."

"Why?"

"Double homicide."

"Ouch." She had never had much to do with Moira, or any of the others, but she remembered that Mark had liked her. Alex had spent most of her life at the orphanage inside herself, communicating with Kana, entering the real world only when she absolutely had to.

Retrospectively, the time had been good for her. It had taught her how to survive, how to look out for herself, how to do everything and never expect anyone to come to her rescue. Vital skills for when she set about finding fun in the cosmos, that dangerous place.

"People were talking about you there," Mark continued, nodding at the picture. "Big war hero, and all."

She had made a name for herself during that conflict, at the helm of _Challenger_ NX-03. Her exceptional skill at impulse manoeuvres had saved the ship, brought the enemy into their sights, and made her required reading at Starfleet Academy. She was the example to which all other helmsmen were held up, and found lacking.

"Glad you said that, because it lets me sound all humble and say: 'I wasn't a hero. I just served with some'."

"You've been practicing that," laughed Mark.

Alex beamed. "Yeah. I hoped I'd be able to say it when they were interviewing everyone at the end of the war. But everyone else said that sort of stuff, so instead I said, 'Yeah, I'm the biggest hero in Earth's history'. I don't think that went down brilliantly with the news execs. Might be why my interview never made the net."

Mark laughed and offered her another cup of tea. Alex was glad to accept. Mark Denham had been the only good thing about the orphanage for her, the only friend she had had in that place. They had stayed in touch after they had both been given to different foster homes, writing regularly. Alex remembered playing against him in a school soccer tournament when they were both eleven. She had been midfield, he'd been a striker. Devilishly fast and really skilful with the ball. He could have gone far, if he had had the money. She had intentionally fouled him in the match, putting him out of the game. The referee hadn't seen it. He had been furious.

He had ended up working in some dull computing job in town. Long hours, uninspiring work, but it put bread on the table, he said. Alex thought of her adventurous, often exciting life, and felt bad about it. She couldn't imagine herself doing anything else, though. Even if she had never ended up with Starfleet, she would still be out there, either in the _Wing_ or flashing around the universe under Kana's power. She was built to wander, not to sit at a desk and trudge through a normal life.

She felt honestly bad for her old friend, and even worse for Charlie. Poor kid. In this modern age, no one should have to suffer like that. But there were limits to medicine's powers. Even if he could have afforded the best doctors, there was nothing that could be done for Charlie.

Nothing on Earth, anyway. Alex was certain that, somewhere out there, she could find something that would save him. She hadn't stopped looking, and she wouldn't.

And Miranda thinks I'm a bad influence, she thought bitterly.

As the memories of the rest of that day threatened to creep back into her head, Alex dived into conversation with Mark, to keep them at bay. How had the reunion been? Who had been there? What was everyone up to these days? Any millionaires in the old group – they always told us that rags to riches story when we were at the orphanage…?

Anything to keep her mind off the rest of the day. Off Sarn, and feelings that she didn't understand.

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"Captain? Bridge to Captain Drake."

He groaned as he rolled out of bed and fumbled for the comm panel. Since the _Daedalus_' recovery he had slept long, peaceful hours every night, getting a solid six hours sleep every day. He had become too used to it, too comfortable in bed. He should have known that it wasn't going to last.

"Drake here." His voice was croaky, his throat dry. He had been snoring, hadn't he? He thought he'd got that under control at last. He stomped into the bathroom to fetch a glass of water.

"Sorry to wake you, Captain," came the whispery voice of his first officer, an Andorian woman named Tholiar. "We're receiving a priority communiqué from Admiral Archer."

He was still feeling sleepy; it took a moment for the name to register. "Starfleet Command?"

"Yes, sir."

"Okay. Give me a second to put a robe on."

"Yes, sir."

He sat at his desk and turned on the small monitor. Admiral Jonathan Archer, former captain of the _NX-Enterprise_ and the first man to lead a true deep space mission, began immediately. "Will. Sorry to wake you."

"It's all right, Admiral. Go ahead."

"There's no easy way to say this, so I'm just going to come out and say it. At oh-four hundred hours, we received an emergency distress beacon from the Federation research vessel _Von Braun_. There was also mention of strange happenings aboard ship, but the message wasn't clear about what that meant." He switched to a less formal tone of voice. "I'm sorry to put you in this position, Will, I know you have a relationship with a _Von Braun_ crewman, but yours is the only warp seven starship available. There's a carrier group in the sector, and I've ordered them to change course, but it will take them much longer to reach the ship."

Drake willed himself to be calm. "Of course, Admiral. How are we to proceed?"

"A party of Starfleet Search and Rescue specialists are on their way up to you right now, along with a specialist towing shuttle. They should reach you in two hours. Their group includes medics, security personnel, and engineers."

"Medics? Security? Are they necessary?"

Archer was apologetic. "We don't know. The distress call made no mention of casualties, but we're preparing for the worst. I know you didn't want to hear that. Full reports about the ship and all personnel are being uploaded to your database now, along with a copy of the distress signal and their coordinates."

"Understood, Admiral. We'll depart as soon as the SSAR team is aboard."

"Very good, Captain. Bring them home. Starfleet out."

The screen went blank, and Drake took a moment to steady himself before he hit the comm button. "Commander, where is Alex?"

"On the surface, Captain. She went down several hours ago."

"Get her back here. Now."

"It will take some time, sir."

"No, it won't. Beam her up. On my authority. Drake to security office."

"Deputy Chief Vorn, sir."

He had hoped to hear from the chief, but he should have known better. It was the middle of the night, and the ship was docked with Starbase, which usually guaranteed quietude. Inogashira, like most others, was taking advantage of the opportunity to get a proper night's sleep.

"How many of our people are off ship right now, Mr Vorn?"

The reply was hesitant. "Eighty or so, sir. I can check."

"Don't bother. Wake Inogashira and the off-duty security personnel. I want everyone back aboard the ship in two hours. That's all you've got, Mr Vorn. Two hours. After that, we're leaving spacedock. If you can't find our people round up any unassigned crewmen you can. Stick them in uniforms and call them Endeavours, but I want this ship crewed and ready for flight in two hours."

"Understood, sir."

He clicked the bridge circuit on again. "Commander, status of the senior officers?"

"Myself, Chief Fran, Lieutenant Brok, Chief Inogashira, and Doctor Ilerson are aboard ship, sir. Mr Walker has already disembarked, and the senior comm and navigation officers are visiting family on Mars."

"We don't have time for them to get back. Put Pini on communications for now, Riker on navigation."

"Aye, sir. Should I have Mr Green take the science position?"

With Max Walker gone, Carth Green was the senior scientist aboard the _Endeavour_, and the obvious next choice for the position. The problem was Drake didn't like the man one little bit. He was brash and cocky, and cared too much about his reputation with the men to manage them as he should. He would, frankly, rather have Pini, and the young woman was a disaster.

Time to make the offer to his candidate, then.

"Not yet. Have Doctor Sarn report to my quarters. Tell the chief to begin engine start up, and be quick about it. I want this ship ready to launch as soon as our SSAR friends are aboard."

"Aye, Captain." She didn't know what the rush was all about, but she was professional enough to do her job first and save the questions for later. Drake liked that about the Andorian.

While the first officer handled the complex tasks required to get the ship back into space, Drake dressed and poured himself a cup of coffee. He supposed he had at most twenty minutes before Sarn and Alex reached his cabin. By then, he had to know exactly what he was going to say to both of them.


	3. Chapter 3

**_Chapter Three_**

"What in hell?" Barked Alex, as she materialised on the main transporter stage. She was positively furious, hands quickly clenching at her sides, her body tensing, and it looked like she was going to lash out at someone – whoever came near. Fortunately for the helpless transporter technician, she was practiced at controlling her violent impulses, and after a few deep breaths she felt better.

She was still fuming, though.

"Hey, mate. I don't recognise you. What's your name?"

"Ensign Sawyer, sir. Transporter control."

She nodded, as though to say that yes that was right. "Sawyer. What am I doing here?"

He had practiced the reply in his head. "Captain's orders, Lieutenant. All personnel to return to the ship as soon as possible."

"What? Why didn't he comm me? I'd have flown back up."

He stood his ground admirably. "As soon as possible, sir. Direct orders."

"We'll see about that," she muttered darkly, striding for the door.

"_Alex,"_ said Kana, appearing at her host's side. She very quickly wasn't at Alex's side, as the human was striding ahead so rapidly. For a little woman, she could move awfully quickly when she wanted to. Kana started to walk after her, before remembering that she could just as easily blip her ghostly form right in front of the human (oh, the advantages of having a physical anchor) and did that instead. _"Calm down."_

"_No. We were busy, Kana. We were playing with Charlie. The poor sod gets little enough happiness in his life as it is. We were giving him a good time, and we get snatched away from that on a bloody whim."_

"_Alex…"_

"_No!"_

She strode into the turbolift and slapped the button for the bridge. Alex could never stay still, she was always fidgeting; usually that was out of excitement, but right now it was anger that made her body twitch. Her fists were clenched and she rocked back and forth on her heels, looking like at any second she might smash something.

Kana wasn't finished trying to hammer sense into her other self. _"You know how I hate to take any side but mine, but Will probably has a good reason for dragging us up here."_

"_What reason? That's what I want to know. And if it's some bloody Starfleet function or other, I'm gonna be pissed."_

"_I think it's far more serious than that."_

Alex finally looked at her other soul, and she saw that Kana was concerned about something. Anything serious enough to worry the other Nain was serious indeed, and Alex lost a lot of her anger. _"What? What is it?"_

"_I can sense something, Alex. Very faint, very distant, but growing steadily darker, more powerful. A threat awakening in the depths of space."_

"_Specifics?"_

"_I don't know." _For a brief instant, before she could cover it, she looked utterly helpless._ "I've never sensed anything like it."_

That meant a lot to Alex. Her other self had lived for…for how long? Longer than human civilisation had existed at any rate. If this was new to her it was something to take notice of.

But did that also explain why it frightened her? Something new after all this time; something that she didn't know how to deal with. Maybe that's all that spooked her: fear of the unknown.

"_I know this much, Alex,"_ continued Kana, unaware of her host's thinking. _"It's reaching out to us."_

"_Us? You and me?"_

"_Us, this crew. All of us. It knows us. It wants us."_

"_You're winding me up, aren't you? Trying to get me spooked."_

Silently, Kana shook her head but Alex still wasn't convinced. She had a bit of a mean sense of humour, Kana did, and often she wouldn't admit when she was joking or not.

The turbolift opened onto the bridge, which was a bustle of activity. Commander Tholiar was pacing the lower command area, issuing orders to crewmen and across the comm, barking for reports; unfamiliar faces were manning half of the stations, the regular personnel off the ship and hastily being recalled. An overworked Pini was struggling to perform the jobs of both science and communications officer, and Brok was fumbling at the security station, all of the proper security people off rounding up the Endeavours on Spacedock.

Susan was also on the bridge, staying out of the way. She turned to Alex with a very serious expression on her face and said, "She senses it too?"

Alex nodded hurriedly, more interested in Tholiar than Susan and whatever doom she thought could feel. "Commander!"

"Lieutenant. Can you recommend someone for the navigation position?"

"Sure. Cartwright. What's –"

"Mr Cartwright is unavailable."

"Lance, then. Riker. What's going –"

"We have received new orders. The ship is departing in two hours." Tholiar seemed determined to prevent her from finishing any sentences.

"Two hours? Where the hell are we going?"

"I don't know."

Alex's brows became one. "You don't know? How can you not know?"

Tholiar spared a moment to give Alex a withering stare. "I do not need to. We must be ready to launch in two hours. That's all I know, that is all I need to know. The same goes for you."

"Yeah. Not quite." She disappeared back into the turbolift before Tholiar could stop her and pressed the deck five button. If Will wasn't on the bridge he was probably in his cabin, going over their new orders.

This would have to be one hell of an important assignment to pacify her, she vowed that as the 'lift began to descend.

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"Captain."

"Doctor. Come in." He offered her a seat, but as he expected the Vulcan preferred to stand. That was all right by him and he perched himself on the edge of his desk. "As you know, Lieutenant Walker has left us to teach, and I'm in the position of selecting a new science officer. As you're no doubt also aware, this ship is in a rush to get back into space. We have been given a new assignment: a vital rescue mission. Because of the urgency, I don't have time to bring on a Starfleet-approved officer to replace Mr Walker; we have to be gone in two hours. I'm telling you this because I want you apprised of the situation. I also want you to know that this urgency has only accelerated my asking you this, it is not the reason I'm about to make you this offer."

"I see," said Sarn, as confused as the Vulcan would allow herself to be.

Drake didn't let her stay that way for long. He spoke very honestly. "Doctor, when you first came aboard I was set up to dislike you. I don't hide the fact that I've often found Vulcans arrogant and impossible to work with. You aren't. In the time you've been aboard this ship, I've come to deeply respect your abilities and your involvement in this crew. I'm not the only one. I'm often told of your vital involvement in many of our science teams' projects. You probably know the department as well as Max."

"It is possible," she acknowledged. She had practically been the number two in the department since she had joined the crew, a position that both Walker and Green had resented her.

"You're on extended loan to us from the Vulcan Science Institute, aren't you?"

"Indefinite loan," came the clarification. She had volunteered to liase with Starfleet, and the Institute had been glad to be rid of her. Most of the members they loaned only served for a couple of months, before returning to the home planet.

Sarn hoped not to go back.

The captain hoped for the same thing. "I'd like to make the situation a little more permanent."

"What do you mean, sir?"

He stood and faced her eye to eye; made his offer. "I want you as my head of science. More than that, I want you in Starfleet. I'm offering you a field commission of lieutenant, which will be confirmed by Starfleet Command as soon as possible."

Sarn was taken aback by the unexpected offer. "Lieutenant Green…"

"Is unfit for the position," he told her immediately. "You're the only person on the ship I'll offer the job to, Doctor. If you turn me down, I'll have to turn to Command to issue a replacement officer. I don't want to do that. I'd rather have someone who knows the job through and through, knows the ship, knows the crew, and who I know I can trust. That's you."

"Thank you, sir." She nodded. She didn't even need to think. "I accept."

"I hoped you would." The captain offered his hand and after a moment Sarn took it and shook. He beamed. "Congratulations, Lieutenant. You'll have to fit yourself out with a uniform. Since we're under such stringent launch conditions, you won't have time to get one from the station. Speak to the quartermaster."

"Aye, sir."

He felt it only fair to warn her, "You might suffer some resentment from Green, and others. I expect you to be understanding, but if they get too vocal, or turn resistive, report it to the commander or myself."

She knew better than the captain who to expect resentment from, and it wouldn't just be Carth Green, or even only the people in the science department. There were a number of Endeavours, human and non-human, who resented Vulcans for not playing a bigger role in the Federation and Starfleet. They would not be happy taking a subservient role to her.

But she had an idea of how to handle that. "Captain, is Alex my superior officer?"

He wasn't sure why she was asking that question, but he answered it anyway. "Yes. She has seniority."

"I will take my problems to her, sir. If that would be acceptable. She has an effective way of handling disobedience."

Drake couldn't help smiling at that. Young Ms Nain was pretty good at getting people to shut up and do their job. She tended to do so by threatening people, which wasn't an approved Starfleet method, but it worked. Probably because no one ever doubted that she would make good on her threats if pressed. "She also has a way of being disobedient…"

The cabin door snapped open and Alex barked, "What the hell's going on, Will? I get snatched up from leave – hi, Sarn – the ship's in a panic, we're racing to launch, half our people are missing, and Tholiar tells me we've got some secret new orders. What the hell?"

"Close the door, Alex."

She did as she was told, but didn't stay quiet for long. "This had better be spectacularly important, Will."

"We're responding to an emergency distress call from the _Von Braun_," he said calmly.

"Oh." Alex collapsed into his comfortable chair, the anger sucked out of her. "What happened?"

"Unknown."

"Understood. I'll get us there as fast as possible. Excuse me; I'll go motivate my department." She paused at the door, looked back and gave him a heartfelt, "Sorry."

"Alex," called Drake, not wanting her to go just yet, but suddenly unsure of why he wanted her to stay. Just for company, he decided. He felt better when she was around. Somehow, she made everything all right. Always did. Every time she got involved in something, things turned out for the best. Being around her gave him confidence.

He shouldn't need her for that.

"Sorry about spoiling your day."

She smiled. "There'll be other days."

"Very good. Dismissed, Lieutenants."

"Sir," said Sarn, while Alex frowned. They stepped into the corridor together, and once the door was closed behind them, Alex asked the Vulcan, "Was I hearing things, or did Will say lieutenants? Plural?"

"He did."

"Poor man. He's losing his marbles."

"I have been made a lieutenant in Starfleet."

Alex did a double take. "Come again?"

"Captain Drake has made me a lieutenant. I am the new science officer."

"Really?" Alex laughed triumphantly and swept Sarn up in a crushing hug. "That's fantastic! Sarn, I'm delighted for you. I…oh. Oh, I'm sorry. I shouldn't be touching you. Sorry."

"It is all right."

"No, it's not. It's a breach of Vulcan etiquette. Stupid, stupid," she took an awkward step back, hanging her head.

Sarn raised an amused eyebrow. "You break human etiquette constantly."

"Yeah, but…I don't want to offend you."

"You do not offend me."

Alex perked up. "Really?"

"If I objected to you touching me, I would have said."

Reassured, Alex hugged her friend again, although she did so more gently this time, and only briefly. "Congratulations, Sarn! You deserve it. Hey, this means we'll be working more closely from now on. And there'll be someone other than Brok to talk to when I get bored. I think he'll be grateful for that."

"Probably," agreed Sarn, who knew all about Alex's game of teasing Brok when she got bored – which happened pretty quickly when the human was on duty.

Happy thoughts were cascading through Alex's head, and she was skipping around excitedly. "Oh, I just thought, you'll need a uniform. You're a lieutenant, right? Same rank as me? I can lend you one of my jackets. We're about the same size. Well…except for the bust. You're a bit bigger than me in that area. But it'll fit. All you'll need is the boots, trousers, and a green shirt, and you can get all that from Bill, the quartermaster."

"Won't you need the jacket, Alex?"

"Nah. Hardly ever wear uniform." She grinned mischievously. "Besides, I've got two. You can have one; I'll have the other. We'll just have to wash them regularly. No problem. Come on. Let's get you dressed."

"_Dressed, or undressed?"_ Teased Kana.

Alex refused to rise to the bait, and showed Sarn down to her cabin. As she opened the door, she realised that this was the first time that the Vulcan had visited her rooms and she hadn't warned the woman what to expect. Half-read books, empty beer cans and discarded clothes littered the floor. Alex led her friend in, stepping around the worst of the junk, chuckling at how carefully Sarn mimicked her footsteps.

"Your jacket is not in this…arrangement?"

"No, no. I take good care of my uniforms and my cloaks. They're over here. Or is it there?"

Sarn knew Alex well enough to realise when she was kidding, and she responded to the woman's comments with a raised eyebrow, waiting for Alex to laugh, as was inevitable. She opened her wardrobe and rooted inside. Nothing was hung up in any order, and it always took ages for her to find anything. While she rooted through, she talked, "Sorry about the mess, Sarn. I don't get a lot of visitors."

"You are also famously untidy."

"Course I'm not. I'm the epitome of neatness and sophistication, I am," grinned Alex. "Here we go, Sarn. One Starfleet jacket, lieutenant's stripes, all fresh and clean."

Sarn took the jacket and was impressed to find that it was even ironed. She slipped it on over top of her earth-coloured Vulcan science tunic.

"How is it?"

"An acceptable fit."

"Ace. Stay put a moment, I'm going to get changed into my uniform." So saying, Alex threw off her trousers and tugged on her uniform pants, pulled her red shirt over top of her vest, and hung her jacket from her shoulders. In a few seconds, she was dressed and ready for duty.

Sarn's eyebrows were raised and Alex felt a flush of embarrassment. "Sorry. Guess I should have done that in the bathroom, huh?"

"It was…unexpected."

Deciding that if Sarn had been upset she would have said something, or at least looked in the other direction, Alex decided not to worry. She clapped her hands together and let the excitement sparkle in her eyes. "Let's get over to the quartermaster. Can't wait to see you in uniform."

He was far less accommodating than Alex. Bill Dyle was a grumpy old man, a Starfleet quartermaster of thirteen years – twelve more than he would have liked. He was of the old stock of human, who blamed the Vulcans for everything that was wrong on Earth. As soon as he heard that Sarn wanted a Starfleet uniform, he suddenly had nothing in stock that would possibly fit her. She tried to deal with him reasonably, pointing out that he had been restocked when they reached Earth, but he was adamant.

"Cut the crap," said Alex, throwing her patience away. "Black boots, black trousers and a green shirt, in Sarn's size. Fetch, fetch."

"I can't just give out supplies to anyone."

Her hellish eyes burned into his and he flinched. "You can give the head of the science division a uniform, or you can eat the head of navigation's fist. Your choice."

As he shuffled off to check his stock, Alex smiled at her friend. "As my foster father used to say: always give them a choice."

The Vulcan hadn't known that Alex had had a foster family. She didn't know much about Alex's past at all – she never spoke about it. She always claimed that only the present concerned her, because both the past and future were out of reach; but she loved to listen to stories about other people's childhood experiences. Sarn had wondered why for a long time, but had never felt it appropriate to ask.

Sarn accepted the bundle of clothing from Dyle, they returned to Alex's cabin and the Vulcan got changed, showing no more decorum, and a lot more flesh, than her friend had. She patted down her new uniform, while Alex evaluated her appearance. "Gorgeous," she decided.

"_If stripping in front of you isn't proof of infatuation I don't know what is."_

"_She's Vulcan. Modesty is illogical."_

"_You are determined not to see the obvious."_

"_I'm determined not to mess this up for myself. Slow and careful."_

"_Pfft. Women like people of action."_

"_Women like _men_ of action. Some of them do, anyway. This is too bloody complicated for my liking."_

Kana made a whining baby noise and disappeared.

Maybe the spirit was right, she pondered as they rode the turbolift back to the bridge. Maybe she should just come out and be honest with Sarn. An okay idea and the one that Drake promoted as well, but it was difficult to do when she still wasn't sure how she felt about the woman. Affection, yes, attraction, yes, love…she wasn't sure.

The bridge was still a hive of activity. New people had replaced some of the old bridge hands, but Pini was still rushing back and forth between communications and the science console.

"Ensign," called Sarn, "I will take science. Man communications."

"Okay, Sa…I mean, aye, sir," she noticed the uniform.

Alex decided to break the news to everyone, starting with the first officer. "Tholiar, has the captain informed you of the new staffing arrangements?"

"I am unaware," the Andorian said, although her glance at Sarn probably told her all that she needed to know.

"Oh good. Then let me introduce the new senior science officer, Lieutenant Sarn."

"Congratulations," said Tholiar tonelessly. "Take your station. I will expect a full debriefing on the status of your department by oh-eight hundred tomorrow."

"Aye, sir."

The Andorian was more pleased by the Vulcan's appointment than she let on. The little twitch of her lips told Alex everything, and she couldn't keep from smiling. Tholiar had to act neutral, knowing full well that opinion over Sarn's promotion would be divided at first, but the helmsman wasn't fooled. She wondered who honestly was. Probably quite a few people, actually. Most weren't as observant as her.

"Lieutenant Nain, take your position as well."

She dropped into her seat, giving Lance a friendly nod. "How're we doing?"

"We're heating up the warp coils right now. Impulse and thrusters are standing by, but the subspace drive won't be ready for a while. We aren't going to make the captain's two hour deadline. Not by a long shot."

"What's coil charge?"

"Sixty-four percent."

Far too low to take the ship into warp. A vessel the size of _Endeavour_, with Starfleet's most advanced nacelle design, required the coils to be charged to at least eighty percent to achieve warp one velocity.

"Shit," said Alex, not as quietly as she thought, as both Tholiar and Sarn turned their heads her way. "Problem?"

"I'd say. Warp coil charge isn't even sixty-five percent. At this rate, we aren't going to be going to warp this side of Christmas."

"_And even longer to get to a speed where you could actually reach the _Von Braun_ some time before its crew dies of old age."_

She hated it when Kana had a point.

"Why are the coils uncharged, anyway?" Alex asked. "Everything was working when we docked."

"The nacelles were damaged by the Vyar," Tholiar said. "Chief Fran had to take them off line to perform repairs."

"Why discharge?"

"He needed to work on the interior of the nacelle as well."

Alex scratched the back of her head. "Sounds like a pretty rubbish excuse to me."

Tholiar ignored the irrelevant comment. "Is it possible to accelerate the process?"

"I know a few tricks, and I bet Lance does, too. The only problem is my tricks have a seventy percent chance of fracturing the warp core."

"Sixty-two," said Lance, with a shrug. "Not much better."

"Indeed not," Tholiar agreed.

Sarn left the science console and joined the group in the centre of the bridge. "I have been studying the ship's warp engine design. I can assist the engineers."

"Go."

As the Vulcan headed for the turbolift, Pini let out a frustrated sigh and got back to her feet. Alex laughed and called, "I'll handle comms for you."

"Shouldn't you be at the helm?" Asked Lance, quietly.

"Nah. Unless Sarn gets the engines working, we aren't going anywhere, are we?"

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"Chief Engineer."

Horris Fran wriggled his way out of crawl way and dropped down to the main deck of the cavernous engine room. Everywhere there wasn't a computer console or screen there was an access hatch, or a bank of working machinery, or a circuit housing. Cables looped across the ceiling and floor like creeper vines, tools and spare parts were scattered all over the place, and people in dirty overalls rushed around the chamber, making alterations to this and that, shouting at each other for not working fast enough. The air was oily and too hot, no doubt the fault of the tubular warp core that bisected the room, running straight up and down through the centre. It was a bland-looking cylindrical tower of reinforced tritanium-duranium composite. Through a single small porthole in the front (the end facing the engine room door) blazed searing white light, the heart of the matter-antimatter reaction.

"Doctor," he said, wiping his greasy fingers on his long dustcoat. "What's with the fancy dress?"

"It is not 'fancy dress'. I have been given a field commission."

"Really? Good for you. If you don't mind, I'm a little busy down here. Walsh! Starboard power coupling's on the blink again. Get on it."

"Yes, Chief." The young man scrabbled to his feet, dashed across the engine room and up a ladder to the second level.

Sarn followed behind Fran as he roamed the engine room, shouting commands and abuse in equal measures. He did not seem aware of her presence, or perhaps he was just ignoring her. In her place, she knew, Alex would have stepped in front of him, or grabbed his shoulder, in some way forced him to acknowledge her. Although that seemed a logical course to her, it would also be giving in to her frustration. That went against the teachings of Surak. She was required to be patient.

I wish Alex had accompanied me, Sarn reflected. She could have been impatient for me.

Eventually, the chief noticed that he had more than one shadow, and he sighed. "Why are you following me around, Doctor? If you hadn't noticed, I've got things to do."

"I am aware. I am here to assist in restoring our warp capabilities."

"Can't. Not in the time frame we've got. It'll take a day or two to get the nacelles up to full charge, and there's no way around that."

Alex had exaggerated a little with her time estimates, Sarn observed.

"The process can be expedited."

"Weren't you listening, Doctor? I just said that it can't be."

"You are mistaken."

He faced her with arms folded, eyes blazing with challenge. "Yeah? Let's hear it, Doc. What do you know that the best minds in Starfleet don't?"

"I know that the plasma current through the nacelles generates tremendous heat. The warp coils have high heat tolerance. However, if they are heated too quickly, they will shatter. Plasma flow is therefore raised in small increments until it reaches optimum current."

"Basic stuff. We all know that."

"The warp coils do not get their energy from the plasma's heat – that is an unwanted bi-product. Coolant is also pumped into the nacelles."

"If you're thinking of increasing the flow, it won't work. We don't have enough coolant in the tanks."

"We are connected to the Spacedock facility."

Fran blinked. "Oh yeah."


	4. Chapter 4

**_Chapter Four_**

"I'm sorry to do this to you, Dick."

"It's an emergency. What sort of doctor would I be if I turned away from people in need?"

"If there was any qualified doctor that could take your place, you know I'd let you go."

Doctor Richard Ilerson looked up from the box that he was unpacking. Only a few hours ago he had finished putting all of his personal collection of medical equipment, specimens, and projects into containers to be transported down to Earth; now he was setting them back out on the shelves. The elderly, white-haired man pushed himself up straight and stretched out the ache in his back. "No apologies, Captain, no apologies. My Hippocratic Oath is still in affect. And even if it wasn't, I would be a pretty lousy excuse for a human being if I just turned my back and said 'not my problem'. No, no. I will do my duty."

"I knew I could count on you."

"Hmph. I think you're getting me confused with our lovely helmsman." He rooted through a crate for his medical scanner. Sickbay had the standard stock of all equipment, but Ilerson insisted on using his own scanner for his observations. He had had it since the height of the Romulan conflict, and it had grown mythical properties in his eyes.

Right now, he couldn't find it.

"No, you're pretty easy to tell apart," Drake said, gesturing at his hair. Ilerson tugged on his own and chuckled. "I thought of trying her style, once. Update my image. Try and shed the creepy old man with the needle reputation that I've been stuck with. Hmm."

"You'd look like a mad scientist out of one of Alex's trashy movies."

"Hmph. I'm not sure that would be an improvement."

Drake looked around the ship's medical ward. For a vessel with a crew of over two hundred, its medical facilities were quite limited, he had often thought. The circular room had six beds around its outside edge, and in the middle of the room were shelves and bits of medical equipment. A short passage branched off from the main area, leading to the intensive care suite, operating room, the diagnosis room with the most advanced biobed and medical sensor equipment, and the doctor's office. It was vastly better equipped than the sickbay aboard the old _Challenger_, but he still didn't think it was enough. There were beds for a dozen people in sickbay. After that, patients would have to be piled up on the floor. Luckily, that had never happened to him yet, but his friend, Captain Jane Frude of the _Excelsior_, had been battered around in a battle with Elasi pirates, and she had had wounded being tended to in corridors.

"How is your medical staff?" Drake asked.

"Hmm. Pretty light, Captain. Mai and Patterson are stuck on Jupiter Station and can't be back in time. Something to do with their quarantine procedures. That leaves me with only one doctor on my staff. Avonivich, Colter, and Bren are off ship, too, so I have two nurses."

"Check with Inogashira. Anyone in her department with medical training, if you need them and she can spare them, take them."

"I will. You're expecting the _Von Braun_ will need medical assistance?"

Drake shrugged. "I think they'll need doctors more than soldiers. I hope, anyway. They're in a quiet sector of space. We've explored that area pretty thoroughly, the nearest inhabitable planet is twenty light years away, and it's no threat."

"Hmm. Are we sure about that?"

"Pretty much. Starfleet visited a year or so ago. Discrete observation – disguised landing parties and everything – the locals didn't even know we were there. They're humanoid, warp capable, but they're peaceful, and they have almost no interest in the galaxy around them. Command debated for a while about making official contact, but they decided it wouldn't benefit us any. So we left."

He dug deeper into the box, pushing aside the deep pile of PADDs that had crept in. Still no sign. "You were involved in this expedition?"

"No," Drake laughed. "I was too busy getting the _Endeavour_ and her crew together. No, Jane went out there."

The doctor knew Captain Frude; he knew pretty much everyone in Starfleet, having worked aboard virtually every ship and installation during his long career. A driven, determined woman, he had liked her a lot, although they had argued frequently.

He bent back to unpacking his supplies, as the vibration of the deck plates changed in pitch. "Sounds like they've got the core up to speed."

Drake put down the medical scanner he had been toying with. "Feels like it. If you need me, Doctor, I'll be on the bridge."

Ilerson was pleased to see the assuredness in the captain's stride. He had been fidgety ever since the admiral's orders had come through, anxious. Now that his ship was back to life and ready to go, he could stop fretting and start taking action. He had never been good at waiting, and that was one of his weaknesses as a captain; he couldn't stand to be left out of the action. Whenever one of his other officers led a mission, he would twitch and worry. He would have to get over that. It would hold him back in the future, be an obstacle to his promotion; no one wanted an admiral who tried to run every facet of his fleet himself.

The triage room door opened and the furry male Tellarite nurse, Jespo, strode out, spotted the CMO, and thrust a report in his direction. Ilerson glanced at it and saw nothing unexpected; set it aside.

"Nurse. Give me a hand here."

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"Captain on the bridge," chimed Pini.

"As you were," Drake called, jumping down to the lower level. "Commander. How are we doing?"

Tholiar moved smoothly out of the command chair, her hands automatically clasping behind her back in a relaxed manner. "Chief Inogashira reports that everyone who can be located is back aboard ship, sir. The engineering department has restored our warp drive."

"With a little help from my favourite Vulcan. Course is laid in, and as soon as we clear Spacedock we'll go to maximum warp. I've got the impulse engines heated up, too. As soon as you give the word, Will, we can be on our way; no messing around."

The captain stood next to his chair, too energised to sit down. "I'm glad to hear it, Alex. Status on the SSAR shuttle?"

"Huh? Bugger knows. Lance?"

Riker pointed at one of his screens. "I have them on approach. Docking in five minutes."

"Clear them for landing. With me, Alex."

They stepped into the turbolift together. While it descended, Alex asked gently, "How are you feeling?"

"Worried," he said honestly. "I wish we at least knew what has happened."

"_Do you?"_

"_I have no idea."_

Alex hid her disappointment. "You know I'll do whatever I can to help. Hell, we all will."

"I know," nodded Drake. "This is a good crew. One of the best."

"Damned right we are," grinned Alex cheerfully. "I don't know why we're waiting for these SSAR losers at all. We should just get in there ourselves. We can deal with whatever's out there."

"Love your optimism, Alex. But the SSAR team has training that we don't. They're rescue experts. And if something has happened to the _Von Braun_ we might need their tug to move it."

"We wouldn't, if you had just given me the time to fly up here in the _Shadow Wing_."

He gave her a look. "Please don't whinge, Alex."

"Sorry."

"_Our friend is feeling a little sensitive at the moment, I see."_

"_Well,"_ said Alex understandingly, _"the love of his life is in some unknown danger. How would you feel?"_

"_That's an irrelevant question, Alex,"_ snorted Kana. _"One I don't have to worry about."_

"_You can't tell me there's no one you love, Kana. I won't believe you."_

"_I didn't mean that. You're the person I care most about. And if you're ever in danger, I'll be right there beside you."_

Alex smiled. She glanced at Drake and wished for his sake that he had his own companion spirit to nurture and protect him. It was a thought that led on inevitably to another: just how did Will and everyone else manage, living alone in their bodies, forever isolated from everyone else in the universe? She thought it must be so sad and lonely. Such a small existence. She couldn't imagine a life like that – if it could even be called life.

The turbolift reached its destination and the two officers disembarked. The shuttle bay was a short walk from the 'lift stop, and they travelled it in silence. The bay seemed strangely empty without the _Shadow Wing_ hanging from its ceiling-mounted docking cradle; a lot lighter, too, without the bulk of the stealth vessel blocking most of the lights.

The far end of the bay seemed to disappear, as the giant space doors opened onto the void. Alex swallowed. "I hate being in the open when the doors slide back."

Drake nodded his agreement, while Kana showed her teeth and said, _"So long as the force field doesn't give out, we're perfectly safe."_

"_That's tremendously reassuring."_

An ugly, blocky shape in Starfleet colours was drifting towards the open bay. Alex looked at it and pulled a face. "That's hideous."

Calling it a flying brick was to be unfair to bricks. It was as though Starfleet had taken a lump of duranium, hastily stuck an impulse engine on the back and a thin warp nacelle along the top and called it a ship.

"It's meant to be functional, Alex, not beautiful."

She wasn't convinced. Why could things never be functional and beautiful?

The tug shuttle parked in the bay and four officers disembarked, followed by sixteen specialist crewmen and their equipment. The captain stepped up to meet them, while Kana said disparagingly, _"The fleet has lost a starship and this is all they give us to get it back with? Twenty people."_

"_I'm sure they're twenty really good people."_

The ranking SSAR man met the captain and stood at attention. He spoke crisply. "Lieutenant Grossman, sir, SSAR. Ensign Diego, engineering; Ensign House, security; Doctor Pratchett, medical." He gestured at the officers with him, two male and the doctor female.

"Captain William Drake, _Starship Endeavour_; my helmsman, Alex Nain."

"Hi," she waved cheerfully.

Drake ignored her and continued, "Cabins have been set aside for you and your people, Lieutenant. Now that you're aboard, we can get under way."

"Finally," said Alex, heading for the exit. She had no time to waste on Starfleet's specialist rescue people; she saw absolutely no use for them. The Endeavours could handle the rescue on their own. Hell, she and Kana could probably do it between the two of them. Why they had wasted so much time waiting for a blocky shuttle and a score of extra people, she didn't know.

"Captain," said Grossman, uncaring of the lieutenant's apparent disinterest in him, "as soon as possible I want to meet with your heads of engineering, security, and medical, so that we can start preparing our recovery plans."

"I'll alert the appropriate department heads."

Alex and Kana shared a glance. _"And Sarn, Brok, Tholiar, and we have no part to play?"_

"_You're just a fly girl."_

"_Yeah, but I hate being left out of the action."_

"Alex," Drake called after her.

"Yeah?"

"As soon as we're under way, join myself, Inogashira, Fran, and Ilerson in the briefing room."

"Sure. Will do."

The SSAR people looked at each other and Grossman said, "Captain, a helmsman's presence is not required."

Captain Drake gave the younger man a very stern look. "My ship, Mr Grossman. I decide who is and who isn't required. Carry on."

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"I could have happily skipped that meeting," said Alex Nain, tugging a bottle of dark red wine out of her underwear drawer and setting it aside. Kana turned her head from the view port, through which she had been watching the stars streak by at almost warp seven velocity, and smirked at Alex. _"You were the one so insistent on being involved in this idiotic operation."_

"Still could have skipped it. I had hoped they were going to tell us something interesting, but those guys know no more than us. Something's happened to the _Von Braun_; they seem to be in trouble. Yeah, knew that already, thanks. Ah, here we go." She found the bottle that she had been looking for and pulled it out triumphantly. "I was starting to think I'd drunk this and forgotten about it."

"_You were going to, weeks ago, but I hid it from you."_

Affection tugged at her lips. "Thanks. I owe you one."

Putting the bottle down on her desk where she would be able to see it easily, she stripped out of her uniform and scattered the clothing around her floor. She fetched from her cupboard a pair of dark blue trousers and a tank top and pulled these on while she continued to hunt around for something else. "I knew there was another reason I was pissed off about leaving the _Wing_ behind."

"_Besides the enormous docking bill that will be waiting for us when we get back?"_

"Yeah. My best cloak's hanging over the back of the flight chair. All I've got here are a couple of older ones, your red ones, and that really thick one I had made when we were on that ice world years back. What was it called?" It was hardly relevant but that there was a gap in her memory – a gap not caused by overindulgence of alcohol – worried her.

"_Ira-Yu-choia,"_ said Kana smoothly. _"A snowy little rock on the far side of the galaxy, of absolutely no interest to anyone at all, if it weren't for those vampire people hibernating in its core."_

"I remember now," Alex nodded. "That one was a mess, wasn't it? And bloody freezing."

"_Yes. Here and now we are, of course, aboard an environment-controlled starship. You probably don't need a cloak."_

"Maybe not," agreed Alex, slipping on a leather jacket instead. She came out of the wardrobe holding onto another green glass bottle.

"_Champagne?"_ Kana's eyes widened. _"Where did that come from?"_

"I hid it from you."

Kana was a lot less grateful to hear that than Alex had been when the positions had been reversed. _"I see. And why do we need it now? In fact, why do you need two bottles of wine? And aren't those your good boots? And your good trousers?"_

"Erm…yeah…" Alex brushed down the front of her clothes. "They're the only clean things in my cupboard."

Kana wished that her host had taken the trouble to invent a vaguely plausible lie. _"Uh-huh. So all the stuff that came back from the laundry yesterday came back dirty, huh?"_

"Would you believe it?" Alex went out into the corridor and strode down it purposefully.

"_No,"_ answered Kana. _"In fact, I'd go so far as to accuse you of being a lying scumbag."_

Alex burped, and her companion demanded, _"What was that for?"_

"_Just trying to clear my system."_

They stopped outside of a cabin, the door number instantly recognisable to Kana. She groaned audibly. _"So that's it, then?"_

Alex tapped the door chime, and a moment later a voice came from the other side, "Who is it?"

"It's Alex. Is this a bad time? I can come back."

The door opened, Sarn standing on the other side in her Vulcan robes. "Come in."

Alex looked around the Vulcan's accommodation, wondering where her personal affects were. Apart from a couple of books of Surak's philosophy on a shelf (unread, as far as she could tell), and three tall black candles on copper stands, there really wasn't anything to distinguish this from an empty room. Alex chuckled. "Well, it's a lot cleaner than my place."

"I have more hangers than you," said Sarn dryly. "Why have you brought bottles?"

"Ah. These aren't just bottles, Sarn. This," holding up the red wine, "is a limited edition 2161 Chateaux Picard, with the Year of Victory emblem on the label. They only made a thousand bottles, and I'm reliably informed that it is the best red wine that money can by. And for however many thousands the damned thing's worth, you'd hope so.

"This is champagne. Not an expensive champagne, mind, but still a pretty good one. I picked it up for about fifteen bucks when we were on SB2. Well, that and half a dozen other bottles. Since it's the only one left, you can take that as a mark of its quality. Take your pick."

The Vulcan showed off that really cute quizzical look of hers. "For what purpose?"

"To celebrate you joining the fleet, of course!" Enthused Alex. "There'll probably be an official party later, when your field commission is confirmed by headquarters, but I thought we should have a toast now. A little party. Just you and me."

She put the bottles down on Sarn's coffee table and sprawled out on the woman's standard-issue Starfleet couch. Hers was a bit more comfortable, thanks to the blankets and shirts that padded it, but Alex wasn't complaining.

Sarn picked up the bottle of fizzy wine. "If this is to be a celebration, I believe champagne is traditional."

"Excellent choice." Alex took the bottle from her. "This is proper champagne, and all. Not some rubbish fizzy wine, but champagne from the champagne region of France. Makes all the difference." She set about removing the cork. "Have you got some glasses?"

While Sarn was fetching them, Kana returned and said, _"I get your plan now. Get her good and drunk, and then have your wicked way."_

"_No."_

The Vulcan came back with a pair of glass flutes in her delicate hands. She set them down on the table next to the expensive wine, just as Alex popped the cork. The human grinned, just managed to resist the urge to spray fizzy white wine around the room, and expertly filled the two glasses, twisting the bottle after each to stop it from dripping.

She raised her glass in a toast, "To the most deserving science officer in the fleet."

They tapped their glasses together and sipped the sparkling wine. Although cultured was a word that could hardly be applied to Alex, she knew a bit about wines, thanks mainly to Kana, who delighted in them. The champagne was crisp and sweet, a delight to drink.

It was also very gassy, and Alex burped. She flushed with embarrassment. She was meant to be on her best behaviour! She put the glass down and turned away. "Sorry. I shouldn't drink that. I can't help myself."

"You are embarrassed?"

It was a new sensation for Alex, who all her life had been a tomboy, forever behaving in ways that most people found rude and improper – and she had never cared what they thought. "Well, yeah. A little bit. I promised myself that I would behave, that just this one night I'd be all decent and proper, you know? I wanted to do this right for you, not disturb you by being gross. I'm sorry."

"You do not disturb me. I have told you that before."

Alex smiled, a little reassured. "Thanks. Congratulations again, Sarn."

The Vulcan dipped her head in acknowledgement, before picking up Alex's expensive bottle of wine and examining it. The Year of Victory holographic seal glinted in the light, the genuine article. "I am curious, how did you afford this?"

"On my salary? I'd have had to go without eating for a couple of months to buy that," Alex laughed. "To be honest, it was sort of spoils of war. I ran across a pirate ship, a couple of years back, and he had a few bottles in his hold. I kept one."

"That is illegal."

"I know. It was stolen anyway." Alex shrugged. "I have very loose morals sometimes."

_"Sometimes?"_

"Why did you not drink it? Or sell it?"

"I've been saving it for a special occasion," Alex told her. "Tonight seemed like a good one to me. I'm really glad you're a proper member of the crew now, Sarn. And the uniform really suits you."

The Vulcan nodded. "I appreciate you loaning your jacket. I am gratified that Captain Drake offered me this opportunity. I had been…" she hesitated, before saying honestly, "I had not been looking forward to going home."

"Huh?" Alex was surprised; she hadn't known that about Sarn. "Why not?"

To no one else would Sarn have answered such a question. She topped up Alex's glass, her own, and explained, "I am not the most conventional Vulcan, Alex. I practice things that are considered…distasteful. I am often compelled to change my behaviour, as you no doubt are."

"_As a matter of fact, I seem to recall someone with pointed ears urging someone with pretty red eyes to act more ladylike earlier today."_

I shouldn't ask, thought Alex, before promptly opening her mouth and saying, "How do you…that is to say, what do you do that other Vulcans find offensive?"

"Amongst other things, I do not control my emotions as carefully as is traditional."

"I did think you were a bit livelier than most," observed Alex, finishing her glass. Sarn topped it up again.

"Like you, I find it difficult to see the logic in totally suppressing natural functions of my body. I have emotions, all Vulcans do. Most bottle theirs and pretend they do not exist. To me, that is both illogical and a living lie. I control my emotions because I must. If I did not I would be as you described today: a wild animal. But I believe there is a difference between control and suppression."

Alex had always found the way Vulcans pretended not to have emotions about the most illogical thing that she could think of – and a nice irony for a race that supposedly lived on logic alone.

"And your folks don't agree?"

Sarn took her place on the couch next to Alex, and the human sat up straighter, giving her room. "No. There are other Vulcans who think as I do, but they are outcasts in our society. I am only accepted because I display far more control than they do."

Alex had heard of the emotional Vulcans. Archer's old _Enterprise_ had encountered a ship of them, during the first or second year of its historic mission. She should have been able to narrow it down further than that, but history – local history, at any rate – had never been her strongest subject. She knew plenty about the history of all sorts of planets around the galaxy, many of which the Federation had never heard of, she knew bits about Earth's past, but the history of Starfleet and Earth's space exploration program was not an interest.

Still, she knew that story; tales about Vulcans behaving oddly always interested her. Those Vulcans had, at first, seemed so pleasant and so human, and the Enterprises had been taken with them. Unfortunately, they had turned out to be all too human, possessing human darkness and weakness as well.

As Sarn had said, she was a lot more disciplined than that. She kept her emotions very much under wraps, only ever letting her feelings display themselves in her eyes. Alex was willing to bet that she was one of the few people on the ship who even noticed, and probably only because she spent so much time looking at Sarn's pretty eyes.

"Sounds like a pretty miserable time you've had of it, Sarn."

"It is why I volunteered to be attached to a Starfleet ship."

Kana Nain hadn't given up eavesdropping. Her immaterial form was sitting on the sill of the cabin's largest window, her yoyo travelling up and down its string. She looked up then and showed her very white teeth. _"Ah, I see. You were hoping that humans would be more considerate and understanding. Sorry, wrong species. They're easily amongst the most bigoted races I have ever encountered. Present company excepted, Alex; you're a little too tolerant, if anything."_

"I'm glad you did," said Alex, emptying her glass again and burping. Her smile was lopsided. "I've loved having you aboard."

The champagne bottle was empty; Alex's head was woozy. She was practiced at beer drinking, but wine went straight to her head and started shutting down synapses. Things that she probably shouldn't say were hovering on the tip of her tongue. Sarn sat next to her on the couch, and Alex's mind strayed. What would happen if she just came onto Sarn, right here, right now? If she didn't say anything at all and just kissed her again? Damn, the Vulcan was almost unbearably attractive. She felt her hands twitching. Couldn't she just stroke that perfect form? Surely Sarn wouldn't object?

No, Alex told herself firmly. No. I do this properly. Flowers, chocolates, romantic diner dates, the whole nine yards. I'm not just going to get us both drunk and shag her! She's better than that!

"Are you all right, Alex?"

"A teeny bit drunk," she belched. "Excuse me. Wine always knocks me out. It's pathetic, really. I can out-drink anyone on the ship, even that really fat guy in cargo handling, if it's beer, or spirits, but wine just does me."

"Perhaps you should have brought a six-pack, instead of this."

"You don't toast with beer, Sarn. It's…" She laughed. "It's not proper."

"Nor are we. It would have been appropriate."

"Hehe. Next time, I promise." She yawned. "I'm tired all of a sudden. Must be the wine, and the heat."

"My rooms are set to replicate a comfortable Vulcan climate. I can decrease the temperature if it discomforts you."

Alex touched an affectionate hand against the Vulcan's smooth cheek. "Wasn't what I meant."

"I understand."

The human withdrew the hand, painfully aware that she had been too forward. After all her promises to herself, all her vows of taking things slowly! Damn, could she not control herself even for five minutes? "I'm sorry."

"I am not."

Alex perked up again. "R…really?"

Sarn held out her hand in the Vulcan gesture between lovers, as she had done back in the theme park. Alex had spent most of the day since then wondering how much of Sarn's affection at the park had been an act, her clever way of keeping away bigots and fools. Pessimism had nearly convinced her that the Vulcan had been entirely acting, that she had as much interest in Alex as she did heavy metal, that the kiss had been as much an experiment as the work she did in the lab all day. She should have listened to her optimism.

Alex returned the gesture, and tested the bounds of this relationship by kissing the Vulcan gently on the lips, savouring the kiss that she got back.

She broke away suddenly, aware of what her hands had been doing. Sarn watched her, one eyebrow raised. "Is something wrong?"

"No. No. This is wonderful. Everything I hoped. But…I'm drunk, maybe you are too. I won't…" She shook her head. "No."

"I am not drunk, Alex."

"I am," she said, trying to help Sarn understand. She brushed a hand lovingly through the Vulcan's silky black hair. "Oh, Sarn. You're so, so beautiful. It's so hard to stop myself pouncing on you right now. But I…I want to do this _right_."

Sarn could have told Alex that she was in full control of her faculties, that she would not object in the slightest if Alex 'pounced' on her, that she had looked lustily after the human since almost the first day they had met, but she said none of these things. She understood that it was important to Alex that they do this right, as she put it. She wanted more from Sarn than to fulfil her animal desires, and the Vulcan was glad to know this. She was looking for a life partner, not a fling.

Alex didn't know any of this. All she saw was her Vulcan friend looking back at her steadily, and she thought she could read disappointment in Sarn's eyes. She said weakly, "Maybe I should go."

"Do not," requested Sarn.

Alex sat back down, a confused, woozy smile on her face. "Okay. Do you mind if I kip on your couch, then? A couple of hours sleep and I'll be good as new. Promise."

"Of course."

She draped a spare blanket over Alex, who had fallen asleep in the time it had taken the Vulcan to fetch it from her cupboard. For a moment, she stood and observed the sleeping woman. She was a strange, quirky person, over-emotional, often arrogant and badly behaved; even if she had been male, her parents would not have approved of the match. And yet Sarn adored her. She could not define what it was about Alex Nain that made her so attractive, and she did not try. Even the Vulcan masters had long ago ceased trying to find the logic in love.

And she was very much in love.

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Captain Drake was also very much in love. Unlike Alex and Sarn, however, he was completely unable to sleep. While the two women rested comfortably knowing that the other returned their feelings of attraction, the captain was kept awake by the smiling photograph of Annabelle on his bedside table, and the fear of what might have happened to her.

Even at maximum warp they were still half-a-day from the _Von Braun_. He tried to reassure himself that, no matter how bad the situation, that ship's crew could survive until they arrived. Even if they had been forced to abandon ship, the escape pods had supplies to last for weeks. They should be all right.

Should.

Drake rolled over and tried clenching his eyes more tightly, but that just brought his memories of Annabelle into clearer focus.

It was hopeless. He flopped onto his back and stared at the ceiling, waiting for the day shift to begin.


	5. Chapter 5

**_Chapter Five_**

"Good morning, my love."

I wasn't dreaming, thought Alex, sitting up. Sarn was standing nearby, composed and elegant in her dark brown robes, and she felt the now familiar surge of warmth at being in the Vulcan's company. The equally familiar dirty thoughts floated in her mind, and had to be put down.

"Good morning," she grinned. Sarn had considerately placed a glass of water and a pair of painkiller tablets on the coffee table that had held their wine glasses the previous night. Alex gulped down the water but ignored the pills. "That's better."

"How do you feel?"

"Pretty spry, really." She stretched catlike on the couch. "I never get a hangover, so that's okay. Hey, I'm sorry about last night, by the way."

Sarn had to work to stifle her disappointment. "You are?"

"Yeah." She stood and stretched again, clasping her hands over her head and reaching towards the ceiling with her palms. "I'm such a total lightweight when it comes to wine. You won't tell anyone?"

"I…shall not."

Alex stepped over and kissed her. "I still mean every word I said, don't worry about that."

"I am…most relieved," said Sarn, making probably the biggest understatement of her life. "I am preparing breakfast. Simple porridge. Would you join me?"

"Of course."

Sarn went into the next room to serve her meal. As soon as she was gone, Kana appeared in the doorway, arms folded, a displeased look on her face. When Kana got angry her red eyes thinned and thinned until they disappeared into two black slits. _"After all that time yesterday, asking Will and I for advice, you didn't pay attention to any of it."_

"_Huh? What are you talking about?"_

"_You made a move on Sarn."_

"_Does that bother you? I mean, the thought of me being with…"_

Kana hissed, _"Alex, I will make no judgement on who you should love. Sarn is a beautiful and wonderful woman. If your heart leads you to her, I hope that you will both be happy. But understand this: there are few things that I think really matter, and love is one of them. Sarn loves you, deeply, madly, completely. Neither of us can deny that any longer. The way you acted last night, and just now, have convinced her that you return her affections equally. And you had better! Because if you don't, you will crush her, and no amount of Vulcan meditation will take that pain away. Do you understand me?"_

Alex shook her head. _"No. This love thing is confusing me, Kana. It's…well, it's alien to me. How do I know if I'm in love or not?"_

"_If you don't know you should have given her no reason to think that you are!"_

"_Maybe I should just play along, right? At least, until I know how I really feel. Would that be right?"_

Kana sighed. She shook her head and tried to make her friend understand. _"No, Alex. There is little worse than loving someone and finding out that they do not share your affections. The longer it goes on, the worse that pain will be when it comes."_

"_But if I tell her now that I don't…and I really do…this is so hard."_

"_I know. I'm not sure whether you are lucky or not that you haven't been in a situation like this before."_

Alex looked out of the nearby viewport, watching the stars flash by as the ship continued on her course. She had spent so much time in space that she found the view of the endless black deeply comforting. When she felt particularly down she would sit and stare at the stars.

Today, it wasn't helping.

"_I could have done without it. Kana, I want to be with her, I think about her often, when she's with us I feel…lighter, more energised. Is that love? Or is it just lust? Are our spirits one, or do I just want to get her clothes off? I have no idea."_

The doppelganger Nain couldn't help chuckling. _"Our spirits _are_ one, and even I can't tell you. But I'll say this, that you didn't make love to her last night when you had the opportunity is probably a good sign."_

Alex hadn't heard that one before. _"It is?"_ In her experience, it was usually a better idea to leap on someone as soon as the offer came, because it often wasn't repeated. And getting into bed with Sarn…right now there was very little that she wanted more ardently.

"_Yes. It shows that you respect Sarn, a lot more than any of the partners you've had before. Respect is a crucial part of love."_

Alex felt relieved. She knew nothing of love but what she felt for Kana, and what she had read in stories, and to her it sounded…nice. She really hoped that what she felt for Sarn was love, tender and romantic love. _"Good. I'm glad I have you to advise me in this."_

For what my advice is worth, thought Kana miserably, but she was careful not to let Alex see how she felt. For her part, she was sure that Alex was in love with the Vulcan, and she envied her. Love had been very much lacking from her life. She was glad that her counterpart was going to finally experience it; and that she could know love again even by proxy.

"Alex?" Called Sarn. "Breakfast is served."

"I'll be right there."

"_Remind me, do I like porridge?"_

"_I don't think so."_

Alex decided that she could learn to.

Sarn had laid the table with two plain wooden bowls, wooden spoons, a pitcher of water and two glasses. The Vulcan was already sitting at one end of the table, so Alex took the other chair and quickly considered the lumpy white cereal that had been served for her. It had an aroma like bread and cheese, which Alex found fairly appealing. She picked up the spoon and tasted the porridge. It was better than it looked.

"Nice," she said. "Have you put sugar in this, or something?"

"No. It is a Vulcan seed. _Lilinnac_. Sweeter than most human varieties."

"I like. Hey, you've got a little kitchen set up here," she observed. On the side of the dining room, where Alex kept a collection of knickknacks and other junk, Sarn had a bench with a heating element, some pots and pans, knives, and other cooking implements that Alex could just about identify, but had no idea how to use. Cooking, beyond the simple heating up of pre-cooked meals, or chucking pasta into boiling water, was something that Alex had long meant to learn and never got around to. Whenever a fancier meal was needed, she generally let Kana cook it.

"I do."

"Any reason? The chef's not that bad, you know."

Sarn spooned some of the finely ground seed into her mouth. "I am the only Vulcan on board. Rather than inconvenience the galley with a unique menu, I prepare my own meals. It is more logical."

"That's why you're never in the mess hall."

"Rarely. There are some human dishes I appreciate."

Alex smiled. "If you like pasta, I'll be able to repay you for this meal sometime. As soon as I get my ship back. All my cooking stuff's on the _Shadow Wing_."

Mentioning the _Wing_ reminded her that it was on Earth, and that her parking bill was steadily creeping up. She would pass that bill on to Starfleet Command as soon as she got it.

It also opened up an avenue of conversation that Sarn had wanted to take with her friend since they had left port.

"Alex, there is something I am curious about."

Alex could guess what her friend was going to ask. "Where I got the _Wing_ from?"

"No. You have told me as much of that story as I suspect you will," replied Sarn, demonstrating how well she understood her human friend. "I am curious about the _Von Braun_. It is a Federation research vessel. Typically, such ships are sent into well-known regions of space. The _Von Braun_ is in a largely unexplored sector."

No one had mentioned that before, but she saw what the Vulcan was getting at. Alex's brows knit as she contemplated, "Good point. What was it doing way out here? We're already outside the ECZ, and we haven't reached them yet."

"That remains to be determined."

"As soon as we get aboard that thing, I'll get some answers," promised the helmsman.

Sarn didn't like the chilly aggression that Alex was showing. "There is probably an innocent explanation."

"Maybe."

"_But I doubt it,"_ she finished to Kana.

Her other self nodded, looking decidedly worried. _"You're right to be suspicious, and so is she. There is something very wrong about all this, Alex. Very wrong indeed."_

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Diego and House were having breakfast in the mess hall, and not so subtly checking out the ship's female crewmen, as was their habit whenever they were temporarily stationed aboard a starship. Neither of them had a girlfriend back home, or any serious female friends. Quite possibly their way of loudly rating the attractiveness of any women who came anywhere near them had something to do with that.

"Her?" Asked Diego, nodding at a petite brunette from communications, who was helping herself to a bowl of cereal from the breakfast bar.

"Too skinny," House shook his head. "I like them to have some meat on them. Something to get my teeth into."

"I hear that."

"That Vulcan bird from yesterday, she was pretty tasty."

"You're wasting your time, pal. Vulcans aren't worth chasing, no matter how good-looking."

"She's _really_ good-looking. You've got eyes, you saw that."

Diego nodded. "Oh, she's hot, no question. Still pointless, though. I mean, they only put out once every seven years! Could you imagine having her as a girlfriend? Only getting near her once every _seven years_. No thanks. You might as well just have a collection of pretty pictures."

"Yeah, I suppose," House sipped his breakfast coffee. The man had a point of course, but he still wasn't willing to dismiss Sarn from his thoughts. She was gorgeous! She had the sort of body that you normally only saw in pictures, and yet here she was, walking around the ship, so tantalisingly close. But Diego was still right that it would be so, so frustrating to live with her for years and get nowhere near her. You would have to have someone else on the side, he decided, or you would lose it. "What about the redhead?"

"Helmsman?" Diego considered the question. "She's okay. A bit rough, but I like them that way."

"Luckily for you, it looks like we're going to be working with her. She and the captain seem to have quite a close relationship." House smiled maliciously. "You might have some competition."

"From that old guy? Forget it."

"Yeah," agreed Comm Officer Mina Curtis, dropping her dirty bowl and cutlery into the cleaning chute, "no competition. She'd take the captain over you, any day."

The men watched as she stormed out, before glancing at each other. House asked what they were both thinking: "What's her problem?"

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"Captain," said Tholiar, "you do not look well."

"Rough night," he croaked, his throat as dry as the plains of Vulcan. Compassionately, Tholiar poured a pitcher of water and passed it to him. "Thanks. What's our progress?"

They were breakfasting in his private dining area, a small room set apart from the regular mess hall, where the captain and selected guests could appreciate a meal in seclusion. Most mornings, Drake and Alex would sit together and talk while they attacked plates of bacon and eggs; it got them both in the right mood to face the day ahead; but today Alex was nowhere to be seen, and the captain had invited his first officer to join him. She had been surprised by his offer, but had accepted it graciously.

Drake often had Tholiar join him for dinner. She was a polite guest – far, far more so than Alex – but a dull one. Their conversations usually stayed very tightly focused on work-related issues. She had been aboard the ship since its launch back in late July, and still the only personal things he knew about her were what he had read in her file.

"We are maintaining course and speed, Captain. We will reach the _Von Braun_ at approximately sixteen hundred hours, ship time. All relevant departments and personnel are ready to offer emergency assistance to the research vessel."

He hadn't expected anything else, of course. Tholiar was the very definition of a competent first officer: tell her what you wanted to achieve and she would find the best, most efficient way of doing it, and set the crew to their work. She was military through and through, trained to obey without thought any command that her superior passed on. In the Andorian Imperial Guard, with their long struggle against the Vulcans, that had been the ideal to which all officer recruits aspired, and Tholiar had achieved it naturally. In Starfleet, Drake liked his officers to have a little more independence. He liked them to think about what they were doing, to question his orders if they had cause (unless it was a crisis situation, then he demanded instant obedience). Tholiar didn't do that, Alex did too much of it. They balanced each other.

He decided that this was a good opportunity to get to know his first officer better at a social level. He had been putting it off for months, consciously or subconsciously, and he knew that if he let that trend continue for much longer he would never be able to break it. Somewhat awkwardly, he asked, "Have you ever been in a situation like this before? Deep space rescue, I mean?"

"Once before," replied Tholiar, buttering a piece of toast. "It was during one of my people's border skirmishes with the old Vulcan High Command."

Drake thought about the High Command, the now defunct Vulcan military and political command that had for a century followed a policy of ensuring Vulcan's position in galactic affairs remained unchallenged, by whatever means they had deemed necessary. These had included an on-going war with the Andorians, covert manipulation of governments on dozens of worlds, and repeated attempts to stall and disband the Earth's Starfleet. Only with the launch of _Enterprise_, and the efforts of Captain Archer's crew, had Earth finally managed to worm its way free of Vulcan's influence. Four years later, Archer had exposed the corruption and excesses of the High Command, and brought about a change of government on the planet. Sarn and the new breed of pacifistic Vulcans were the result.

"Would you tell me about it?"

In Tholiar's world no question from a senior officer could be refused; but this was on she was content to answer anyway. "Of course, Captain. I was senior flight officer of the warship _Talos_. We were on a patrol of our border when we received a distress call from our sister ship, _Kay'ehl_, indicating that they were under attack by a Vulcan starship. Of course, we responded. We arrived in time to assist _Kay'ehl_. It was being assaulted by a Vulcan strike cruiser, a superior class of ship."

Drake nodded solemnly. He had fought alongside Vulcan and Andorian ships during the Romulan War. Both had been superior to Starfleet's vessels of the time, but he particularly remembered how formidable a Vulcan warship was. Armed with multiple banks of phase cannons and photonic torpedoes, they had packed quite a punch – far more than their human or Andorian counterparts.

Not a patch on the _Endeavour_, of course, but she was a product of a different era.

"What happened?"

"We coordinated our attacks on the Vulcan ship. _Kay'ehl_ had already inflicted some damage, reducing the cruiser's manoeuvrability. The Vulcans had done a lot more damage to _Kay'ehl_. With our two ships combined against them, they knew that they were in a losing position. So they tried to even the odds."

"By focusing their attacks on the _Kay'ehl_?" It was what he would have done: eliminate the damaged, but still combat-worthy, adversary, before focusing all of his attention on the new arrival. A mistake novice tacticians often made was to dismiss damaged ships in favour of fully-functional ones; as long as a starship could still fire its weapons it was a threat. He had seen too many friends forget that during the War.

"Not quite, Captain. They had transporter technology, and at the time we didn't. We didn't even know of the device you and they had constructed. _Kay'ehl_'s shields were down. So the Vulcan captain transported an armed torpedo aboard the ship."

Drake was appalled. "That's a coward's tactic!"

Tholiar chewed her toast. "But an effective one. The blast split _Kay'ehl_ in half. We were forced to abandon our attack to evacuate the survivors before the ship blew up. The Vulcans used that time to escape. Cowards, as you say, Captain."

Cowardice didn't quite cover it as far as the captain was concerned. Even in the most desperate days of the Romulan War they had never stooped so low as beaming bombs aboard the enemy ships. That wasn't warfare – it was murder.

"Who was commanding that Vulcan ship?"

"Sub-Commander Ilarok."

"Ilarok?" Now the captain was doubly appalled, and betrayed. He put down his fork.

Tholiar was intrigued. "You have heard of him, sir?"

"Heard of him? We fought together, during the Romulan War. He was a full commander then, in charge of one of their battleships. He always struck me as an honourable man, but if he was capable of that…"

Although she wanted to forgive the man, for her captain's sake, Tholiar couldn't forget what had been done to _Kay'ehl_. She vividly recalled seeing the ship torn in half by that unexpected explosion. She saw the survivors come aboard, skin burnt and torn, limbs missing, blood everywhere. She remembered cradling her cousin, a tactician on that ship, while he died in her arms. She had thought then, as she did now, that that was no death for a soldier. They hadn't been killed in battle, killed fighting; they had been murdered by a coward's bomb. Whatever Ilarok had done since then that might have been good and honourable; he remained a fiend in Tholiar's eyes.

"Were you involved in the Battle of Kaireth, Captain?"

"I was. Operation Die Pointlessly, as Alex liked to call it." Not one of the highlights of the War. "Yeah, I was there. We both were. Why do you ask?"

"That was the battle where Ilarok was killed." She tried not to sound like she savoured that fact.

"Along with a lot of others," said the captain mournfully. "We nearly lost our own captain that day. We did lose twenty members of crew. I can remember all their names."

She had been involved in the War as well. She could remember the people who died alongside her. She made it a point to remember them all, to carry them with her for as long as she could. She owed them that. Everyone who lived today, in freedom, because of their sacrifice did. She understood the captain's pain.

"It was a fearsome battle. I only heard of it second-hand. I was with forces defending our munitions factories on Echol II at the time."

"That was a much safer place to be." Drake swallowed another glass of water to shore up his throat before he began. He didn't often tell war stories, although his family and civilian friends on Luna longed to hear them. He didn't think that anyone who hadn't fought in the War could properly understand what it meant to have been there. "It sounded like a smart strategic move at the time. If the Romulans conquered Kaireth they would have opened another gap in our line, and that would have been more than we could have taken. We were already stretched thin, defending our outposts and guarding against Romulan incursion from their other beachheads. One more forward base and we would have lost the sector. Command was convinced that Kaireth was going to be it. Nice M-class planet, fairly close to their other bases, and wealthy in resources, including dilithium."

"The planet's indigenous people were nomadic, weren't they, Captain? Simple tribes of farmers."

"That's right. Like the aboriginal Americans. They had absolutely no idea what was going on above their world. You know, some times I wonder if they sat and watched the skies at night, our weapons flashing brilliantly above their world, and tried to work out what was going on. They probably thought the gods were having a fight, or something."

"In a way," smiled Tholiar, "they were."

She had become more animated since they started talking of the war, sitting forward in her chair, icy-blue eyes agleam. Was she war-hungry? Or did she, like Annabelle, love stories?

"Right. The Romulans attacked us with a big fleet, bigger than we'd expected, and we'd expected something pretty impressive. _Atlantis_ was knocked out of the fight in the opening minutes – I don't think they even knew what hit them. Two Vulcan ships followed pretty quickly thereafter. Alex and I were on _Challenger_, in the back row of our squadron, and even we were getting hit. Our fighter screen was dropping like flies, the two corvettes on our wing got pulverised by a flight of those fusion-plasma torpedoes the Romulans used. It looked like we were going to get wiped out. We hadn't even hit back yet, and already our fleet was damaged and falling apart."

"I heard that the command ship was taken out almost instantly."

"That's right. Admiral T'ni was definitely their target, and they hit his ship with everything they had the instant it came into range. He had no chance. Hell, none of us did, really. We were outnumbered, outgunned, and their early victory had almost shattered our morale. We were manoeuvring poorly, our battle plans were all shot to hell, for a moment there it was every man for himself." He filled and drained another glass of water.

"I am astonished that any Earth ship survived the battle. I do not mean to be rude, Captain, but the NX-class was an inferior breed of ship, even when it was brand new."

It was a common comment made by aliens. How had any Earth men, in ships that had been half a century old when they were first made, lived through the conflict? How had puny little NX, NV, and NC-class starships taken out even one birdy, let alone the squadrons they had been sent up against?

"No argument," he laughed. "They were the best we had, though. And you're right, we shouldn't have survived. We had shields, recently installed by some of your technicians, and our phase-cannons had been overhauled, but we were still the weakest thing on the battlefield. But Alex has a way of making ships dance. No one can hit her if she doesn't want them to. Well, ninety-five percent of the time, anyway."

"She is a remarkable pilot."

"Yeah. It's in the blood, I'm sure. It's just natural for her." He smiled fondly. He was alive today because of her flying skill; there could be no denying it. That was why he insisted on having her on the _Endeavour_, why she always flew his shuttles; he trusted no one else to be as good. "Anyway, Alex kept us alive, and we spat back at the Romulans as best we could. We destroyed a few of their birdies, but our minor victories didn't really matter in the greater scheme of things. The birdies alone weren't the problem; it was the Romulan command ship that was causing us strife. With our own heavy capital ships already destroyed, we had nothing that could touch it. Well, I didn't think we did, at any rate. Ilarok thought differently. I'm sure you know that part of the story."

Tholiar nodded. Ilarok had sacrificed himself and his crew, ramming his ship into the Romulan command ship and destroying them both. Humans and Andorians agreed that it had been a desperate last gamble, although they respected the commander for his sacrifice. The Vulcans argued that Ilarok had weighed up all the factors of the battle and logically concluded that the only missile with enough power to destroy the command ship was a vessel such as his own. There was nothing desperate about it, and no gamble either; it had simply been a matter of logic.

Drake drank a third glass of water. "A thousand Vulcans perished in an instant. I'd love to say that turned the tide, but it didn't. The loss of their pendant ship didn't hurt the Romulans anything like as much as we'd have liked. They kept coming, kept hammering us. We fought back as hard as we could. During the fighting, Alex's luck failed us for a second, but that was enough. We took a direct torpedo hit, right over the bridge dome. A section of the ceiling collapsed, crushing the captain and science officer. McCaffrey survived, Reilly didn't. I was lucky. A beam smashed the right side of my console. If I had been firing the torpedoes, rather than the phase canons, I'd have been right under it when it fell."

"A narrow escape."

"Far too narrow. The medics dug Captain McCaffrey out of the rubble and hauled him off to sickbay. That left yours truly in command."

Now that the story had taken on a more personal tone, Tholiar was even more enthusiastic. "What did you do?"

"I gave tactical over to Nwabudike. Remember him? You met him when we were docked to Starbase Two."

"I recall."

"Right. He took tactical. I went to take the helm. I couldn't see Alex – there was a lot of smoke, and the debris had mostly fallen around that central pit where the big chair and helm desk were. I thought she had been crushed, but somehow she'd managed to dodge everything. She climbed back into her chair as I reached it. She was bleeding from a chest wound, but she wouldn't abandon her post. She can be really stubborn like that. Anyway, she managed to get us away from the birdie long enough for Nwabudike to shoot back. We must have got a lucky hit, because it just exploded. So, we were safe for the second, but there was no time to lick our wounds. The Romulans were still in force, and our side couldn't spare us even the time it would take to stick a bandage around Alex's wound. We went straight back into the fight. It looked hopeless."

"And yet we won."

Drake nodded. She was right, they had won, but it had been no victory. "We did. But only because the Romulans had never had any interest in Kaireth. It was all one big feint, and a very expensive one for us."

"That is why Alex calls it Operation Die Pointlessly?"

"Yup," smiled the captain. "She has a way of just saying what she thinks. It's one of the things I love about her. It drives Annabelle crazy, though."

"Annabelle?" The name was unfamiliar to Tholiar, and yet the captain spoke it with devotion and heart. This woman meant an enormous amount to him. She was surprised that she couldn't remember him mentioning her before.

"Annabelle DeCroix. She's my girlfriend. That sounds a bit ridiculous, a bit teenager doesn't it? But that's what she is." He sighed, pained again. "She's also a crewman on the _Von Braun_."

No wonder this mission is so important to you, Tholiar realised, but she didn't understand. Not properly. Like Alex Nain, she had no real understanding of love. It was a word to her, something that she had heard of but never experienced. Unlike Alex, it was something that she had always desperately yearned for – while Alex, experiencing the sensation for the first time, found it awkward and a bit annoying. She thought that love would complete her, make her more than she was now. She wanted to devote herself to another, give her heart, but she had never met anyone who stirred the fires of passion in her.

"We will reach her in time, Captain."

She didn't just say this to cheer up the captain. It was a vow. They _would_ get there in time. She would not allow it to be otherwise.


	6. Chapter 6

**_Chapter Six_**

They were on their way; they were rushing heroically to the rescue. She had to stop them. Had to warn them, before it was too late! Annabelle DeCroix clutched the phase rifle to her chest and hurried towards what should have been the communications suite. She had to get a message to the rescue ship and convince them to abandon their efforts.

It couldn't be allowed to spread!

She reached the door and forced the stuck panels open. She stumbled into the room, her flickering, fading light beam pushing back the shadows. She should have known better than to expect to find herself where she had wanted to be. The anomaly was twisting the ship into knots. Nothing was where it should be, and an awful lot of things that shouldn't be _anywhere_ were roaming the starship.

One such thing sprang at her now, lunging out of the oily blackness, a piercing squeal firing from each of its throats, cutting through Annabelle, echoing off the walls and attacking her from all over. The thing flew at her, a mass of limbs and tentacles, reaching for her, trying to grab her, lash her, rip her apart. She had seen what happened when one of those things got a grip on a person. Once it dug a single claw into you, or lassoed you with a single tentacle, you were finished.

She threw herself onto her back, aimed and fired as fast as she could. The phase rifle shone a pale pink beam, the power cells on their last legs, but it was still enough. The centre of the tentacle monstrosity was a ball of brains and sense organs, and Annabelle's energy lance put a hole in it. The hideous creature collapsed into a twitching mess of useless limbs.

Where was she? Beneath the flesh-like growths that covered most of the floor and bulkheads, it was almost impossible to tell what this place had once been. A lab, maybe, or an engineering workshop, crew cabin, storage room, it was impossible to tell. It wasn't the comm suite, though, that was for certain. It was too small, too square.

She backed out of the room, into a corridor that wasn't the one she had entered through. The anomaly at work again, rearranging the ship. It was impossible to keep track, impossible to find anyone you left behind, or find anywhere safe to hold up. One moment you would be walking through an empty hall, the next you would be on the bridge, surrounded by monsters and condemned to a hideous death.

Death was a certainty now. No one on the ship was going to survive. Annabelle had accepted that. All she could try to do now was to keep this nightmare from spreading any further. If it got off the crippled _Von Braun_, if it managed to get back to Federation space – to Earth, god forbid – then there would be no end to the suffering.

She had to get to the comm suite. She had to get Starfleet to abandon the rescue. To destroy this hell-ship.

She had to.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

There was a knock on the door. Captain Drake put down the copy of _Les Miserables_ he had been futilely trying to read and called, "Come."

The cabin door purred open and Alex stepped in. She was dressed in her full Starfleet uniform, an unusual sight, as unless the ship was being inspected by the admiralty she hardly bothered with uniform. Even on duty she left her jacket hanging open, if she wore it at all. Seeing her in her splendour now, he felt oddly troubled.

"Alex."

"Sorry I wasn't at breakfast, Will. I hope you didn't wait for me."

He didn't move from the armchair. "Not for long. It was all right; Tholiar and I had an agreeable meal. We talked about the war a bit."

"Happy memories," said Alex, sitting down on the captain's bed.

"She seemed to enjoy the discussion," the captain replied. "I told her about Operation Die Pointlessly."

"One of my favourites. Why'd that one come up?"

"She'd fought Ilorak in their border wars."

Alex frowned, running the name through her memory. It didn't immediately click, so she ventured, "I didn't like Ilorak, did I?"

"Not a bit."

She nodded sagely, still not sure who it was the captain was talking about. Luckily for her, he didn't continue that line of conversation. "What happened to you, anyway? Did you oversleep?"

"No, actually. I was awake bright and early. I just didn't have my breakfast in the mess hall. Sarn made me some porridgy-stuff. It was actually quite sweet, quite tasty."

"You had breakfast with Sarn?"

"I spent the night at her place."

Drake was curious and he asked carefully, "Did you…?"

"No."

"You seem pretty pleased about that."

She was, and relaxing into the chair she explained, "We'd both been drinking. I brought some wine around, to celebrate her joining the fleet. And you know how I am with wine. So I was a bit wasted. We got talking, it came up, I said that I found her deeply sexy; she said the same about me, and I know I could have had her right there and then. But I was drunk, and she deserved more than that. So I didn't let it go any further."

"That's…some pretty amazing restraint on your part." He wasn't exaggerating. He had known Alex to walk up to total strangers that she found attractive and put her tongue in their mouths.

Alex grinned, pleased that he had noticed and complimented her. "Yeah. She's special. I'm gonna do this right, Will. I promise."

"I'm glad to hear it, Alex." He still wasn't sure if he entirely approved of this relationship of hers, so he changed the topic. "I can't help noticing you're not wearing any lipstick today."

She ran a finger across her thin lips. Usually, they were covered with black, but today they were bare. "Sarn suggested it. What do you think?"

He knew that any criticism would be unwelcome, but he was so used to seeing Alex with black lips that she looked strange to him without them. Neutrally he said, "I can get used to it. I'm glad to see you and Sarn getting on so well. But I hope you can keep your romantic life out of your mind and concentrate on the mission when the time comes."

"I can if you can," she said, helping herself to an apple from the bowl of fruit on his desk.

Drake cast her a sidelong glance. "What's that supposed to mean?"

She was brutally honest, as was her way. Others might have approached the situation more tactfully, but Alex didn't believe in pussyfooting around. If something had to be said, she came out and said it.

Unless it was something to do with Sarn. That seemed to be the exception.

"It means that it's not like you to hide in your room when we've got a mission to accomplish. When we're sitting around, doing nothing, then yeah, but when there's something going on you're pacing the bridge, or twitching in your chair. So I think there's something on your mind. Scratch that, I know there's something on your mind; and I know what it is."

They had known each other too long for him to even entertain trying to deceive her. "Of course you do."

She bit into her apple and crunched it happily. Her face was smiling, her body relaxed and friendly, but her red eyes were fixed onto his and were very serious. "I could say that fretting won't help, but I won't. It would sound stupid, especially after I spent all of yesterday worrying about my relationship with Sarn. Instead, I'll say this: a leader should be seen to lead."

Her voice had changed for that last part, growing slightly deeper, darker. He had glanced away, refusing to let Alex see how her words were irritating him, but now he turned back to her. She was sitting in the chair with her legs crossed, the apple in one hand, a yoyo in the other. The simple toy ran up and down its string with effortless grace. She watched him through narrowed eyes, no smile on her pretty face. She always looked so bare without a smile – such expressions were an almost permanent fixture of her face. Bare, and hostile. An unsmiling Alex was somehow more troubling than an enraged Klingon.

"Being on the bridge just makes me anxious. We seem to be going so slowly."

"How it makes you feel doesn't matter," she said dismissively, as though he were a particularly dim child that she was trying to explain the alphabet to. "What the crew _believes_ you feel is more important. Hide in your room and you look afraid. You look weak. That is bad for morale."

"When did you get so insightful?"

Her teeth flashed – it couldn't be called a smile. "Born that way. Look, I know how uncomfortable you feel. I know what it's like to worry that you have lost someone you care for."

"_Do you?"_

"You must show your men that you are still in control. They look to you for strength and guidance. Give it to them, Captain."

He felt his temper recede. "Wisdom from your mercenary days?"

"Something like that."

He would never get a better answer from her, but that didn't matter. She was right, and he knew it. He nodded. "I'll head back to the bridge in a minute."

"Good," she said, rising to her feet, somehow without disturbing the leisurely up-down motion of her yoyo. "I'll see you up there."

"Alex," he said as she opened the door.

Kana turned her head back. "Hmm?"

"Thanks. As usual."

"Of course. That's what I'm here for."

"_Next time,"_ Kana moaned, _"you get to make the inspirational speech on your own. Okay?"_

"_But you were so good at it,"_ smirked Alex.

"_Epochs of practice,"_ said Kana distractedly.

"_Right. What you said to Will, about losing someone you cared for? Is that true?"_

"_I've lived a very long time, Alex. You can be sure that I have lost more than one friend and loved one during my life. Plus, I was involved in a war, as I told you. I saw my species die. I'm quite familiar with loss."_

"_Sorry. I shouldn't have brought it up,"_ said Alex.

No, thought Kana, you shouldn't have. Leave the past buried where it belongs, Alex. Hope that it never troubles either of us again.

"Hey. Hey, Nain!"

Speaking of trouble…

"Wait up!"

The SSAR man was further down the corridor, and jogging to catch up with her. Kana stopped and waited, her arms folded and her expression entirely unwelcoming. "Mr Diego. Can I help you in some way?"

Say, by removing a limb, or an organ? She continued silently.

"Just looking for a friendly face."

"_Keep looking,"_ burst in Alex, hotly. She knew very well what Diego's interest in her was. She had noticed him looking at her during the meeting the previous day; she had glimpsed the lust in his eyes. It sickened her.

"I'm sure I can find one for you, Mr Diego."

He chuckled. "I meant you, Ms Nain."

"_If you think that's cute, you're mistaken,"_ hissed Alex.

"_We seem to have something of a role reversal going on here,"_ Kana said, amused. _"Usually, I'm the one making those sorts of comments. Do you want to Change?"_

"_No. If I was in control I'd probably hit him."_

"_What makes you think that _I_ won't?"_

Alex gave the matter a dismissive snort. _"I don't care if you do or don't. Call me when we're on the bridge."_ And with that, she disappeared, her mind retreating into the quiet depths of their shared brain for some privacy.

"Shouldn't you be doing something? Preparing for rescue operations, or some such?"

He shrugged casually, a look of superiority working its way onto his face. "All the planning was taken care of yesterday and the tug's ready to go. We just have to get there, and then you'll see what SSAR can really do."

"I can hardly wait. Now, if you'll excuse me, Mr Diego, I have a ship to fly. We aren't going to get to the _Von Braun_ without a pilot at the helm, now are we?"

She turned away from Diego, but the man wouldn't take the hint and followed her into the turbolift. "Do you think the captain will include you in his team?"

"Inevitably."

"You're pretty confident."

"Will Drake and I have served together since the war. We do everything together."

Ensign Diego acted thrilled. "A war hero?"

"Yes. We did our part," she turned her eyes away from him. "You'll forgive me for not wanting to talk about it, I'm sure."

The turbolift stopped, but not at the bridge. The doors opened onto a stretch of corridor and an anxious-looking Susan. She was fidgeting with the hem of her plain blue dress, her cobalt eyes wide and frightened. She looked up, relieved to see Nain standing in the turbolift, doubly relieved that it was the darker of the two.

"You can sense it. Can't you sense it?" She hurried into the 'lift and gripped Nain's trouser leg. "I know you can feel it. The darkness, creeping around your mind. Dread in your heart. You felt it back on Earth…"

Diego was baffled; the Endeavours weren't in the habit of telling passengers about their Augment crewmen. Even Starfleet Command didn't know about Susan – Drake had forbidden anyone to mention it, and he had falsified ship's records of her origins and how she came aboard. As far as anyone outside the ship was concerned, Susan was the perfectly ordinary daughter of ship's therapist Miranda Pauli. "What's up with her?"

Kana tossed him a weak smile. "It's a game we play. Tell me, Susan, what darkness do you sense?"

"I…I don't know. Something's waiting for us. It's trying to lure us in. It…"

"It took the _Von Braun_, and now it hungers for more."

"Yes! You do know."

Kana nodded, completely ignoring the very strange look that Diego was giving her. "You haven't told me anything new."

The child's grip became more desperate. "You should tell them! Tell the captain. He'll listen to you. We have to turn away. It wants us. It shouldn't have what it wants."

"The captain wouldn't listen to me," Kana said heavily. "This darkness of yours has the perfect lure."

The child understood. "Annabelle."

"Convenient, huh?"

Diego scratched his head, trying and failing to understand what those two were talking about. "This is a strange game you two play."

"We're strange people."

The 'lift finally reached the bridge and two women got out, Kana quickly reaching back in and slapping the button for the engineering deck, sending Diego back into the depths of the ship, and out of her spiky hair. Susan stayed by her side, even when she took her host's place at the helm position, and called Alex's mind to the front. The other Nain took a moment to check the ship's course and speed, then devoted her attention to Susan. Quietly, she said, "What were you trying to warn Kana about?"

"I don't know. I wish I did." She clenched her little fists, frightened and helpless. "But we're heading towards it. We should be running away."

Tholiar, sitting comfortably in the central chair, overheard part of their conversation, and asked, "What are you two talking about?"

"Susan has a bad feeling."

"What about?"

"Our mission."

"We shouldn't go on," Susan begged, hoping that someone would listen, would heed her warning.

Captain Drake heard her voice as he emerged from the turbolift, and he asked, "Why not?"

"Something dangerous is waiting for us."

The captain relieved his first officer of the big chair and watched the stars streak by on the main screen. They were getting closer and closer to their goal. And now Susan wanted them to turn back? No.

"Maintain course and speed."

Susan's eyes widened with disbelief, and despair.


	7. Chapter 7

**_Chapter Seven_**

"Approaching the research vessel _Von Braun_, Captain," said Lance Riker.

"Coming out of warp," Alex added, by the book. The streaks of light on the screen receded into pinpricks of light, and in the centre of the viewing field there appeared a small silver shape, too far away to make out any details of it. From her sensor feeds, Alex could see that it was the _Starship Von Braun_, a Sirel-class science vessel of largely Vulcan design. It had a central, tubular hull, a pair of nacelles hitched onto the back, and a ring structure around the centre, which housed the ship's sublight engines, sensor arrays, and main science labs.

"Sensors register the _Von Braun_, Captain," said Sarn, comfortably ensconced behind her science console. The soft blue glow of her sensor visor played across her face in a way that Alex found dead sexy. "Sensors indicate no damage to the vessel's superstructure; however the engines and primary reactor are offline."

"Bio-signs?"

"I cannot distinguish individual bio-signatures, Captain. Sensors indicate a mass of biological material throughout the ship."

"People?"

"Impossible to determine. The large biomass is making detailed scans unattainable."

Biomass? Thought Drake. He didn't like the sound of that at all.

"Put her on screen."

The research vessel now appeared magnified on the main screen. The captain had never served aboard such a ship, but he had toured one that had been berthed to Spacedock while the _Endeavour_ was still under construction. To his eyes, the ship looked undamaged. The only thing that indicated trouble was the cold, dark nacelles. Primary power was definitely out over there. But why? Some sort of mechanical trouble?

"Open hailing frequencies," he instructed.

Comm Officer James Tucker worked his panel. "Channel open, Captain."

"This is Captain William Drake, of the _Starship Endeavour_. We are here in response to your distress signal. Captain Holler, please respond."

Nothing. For three minutes they waited, and there was no response. Drake turned to Sarn, trying to smother down the deep concern that was growing inside him. He asked, "Is their comm system damaged?"

"Scanning. Receiver and transmitter arrays are operational, Captain. They heard us."

"Is it possible their computer core has failed?"

"No, sir. Scans indicate the computer is functional and active."

He rubbed his beard thoughtfully. This was all damned peculiar. "Any luck with the bio-scan?"

"No, sir. I am still reading one very large bio-signature that encompasses the entire vessel. One moment." She did something with her controls and checked again. "Now that we are closer, I am registering what appear to be secondary contacts."

"How many?"

"I cannot say. The results keep changing, Captain, contacts appearing and disappearing at random. The highest number I have recorded so far is three hundred and five, but it is in constant flux."

Drake's eyes bulged. "Crew compliment of the _Von Braun_ is forty-eight."

"Yes, sir."

What was going on over there?

"Keep trying to raise them, Mr Tucker. Cycle our communication frequencies."

"Aye, Captain."

"Sarn, you said that when we got closer your scans cleared up?"

"Yes, sir."

He looked at the stricken ship again, and tried to do so without thinking of Annabelle being aboard her, in danger. That was hard. "Alex, take us within docking range."

"Okay." She tapped in the course and was about to fire the impulse engines when Sarn called, "No." She obeyed the Vulcan instantly, dropping the hand into her lap, and turning her chair so that she could see what the science officer had to say.

"Why not?" Drake asked, trying to be calm. Sarn wouldn't have countermanded him without reason, he knew. But Annabelle was over there! His concern made it hard to keep his thinking clear. No wonder Starfleet disapproved of officers forming romantic attachments.

"I have been able to ascertain what caused the _Von Braun_'s distress." She pressed a button, and the view screen changed to showing a wire frame model of the research vessel, a blue disk surrounding it, and a graphic of the _Endeavour_ at the edge of the disk. "The ship is trapped within a spatial anomaly, Captain. If we get much closer, it will snare us as well."

I knew I'd made the right decision in giving her the job. "Is that what's disabled their engines?"

"It is a possibility, Captain. The anomaly is emitting radiation unlike anything on record. It is impossible for me to determine what it is doing to the _Von Braun_. I advise against entering the field ourselves, Captain."

"Understood. Are we close enough to get a tractor beam around them?"

"No, sir," said Brok.

"We cannot be certain that a tractor beam would function in distorted space."

Meaning that, even if they had been close enough, there was no guarantee that it would have worked anyway. Great, thought Drake. If only we had good old-fashioned grapplers, like on _Challenger_.

That got him thinking. _Endeavour_ didn't have such primitive, but reliable, technology, but the Starfleet Search and Rescue vessel did, as backup for situations like this where a tractor beam was unreliable.

"What about the tug? Can it get in safely?"

"Unknown," said Sarn. "With no clear understanding of the anomaly's affects, it is impossible to determine."

"We know what it does, don't we? It messes up warp and impulse engines."

"That is a theory, Alex. It may be correct. It may be that the _Von Braun_'s engines were damaged by a party aboard the ship."

That was a thought that none of them had entertained until now. Alex gave it a courtesy thought, but could see no sense in it. "Why would they do that though, Sarn?"

The Vulcan said emotionlessly, "We have encountered anomalies before that affect peoples' minds."

"You mean that it might have driven them all insane," said Drake, surprised by how calmly he could utter that terrible possibility.

"It is another theory, Captain. Until we know more, that is all it can be."

Alex looked thoughtful. "Since they're not talking to us, the only way we're going to get more information is by going over there. The tug's the safest bet. It's designed to pull disabled ships out of virtually any bad thing we know about, and get them back to Earth. It's tough as old boots."

"Old boots?" Frowned Sarn.

"I mean all its systems are ultra-shielded, and it has got redundant backups of everything, especially life support and propulsion. If that anomaly is of the ship-damaging, rather than crew-damaging variety the tug's got the best chance of surviving it."

Drake liked Alex's way of finding solutions where other people saw problems. "What do you suggest?"

"We turn this ship around, so that the shuttle bay is facing towards the _Von Braun_. We get our teams aboard the tug and launch. Then we attach a tractor beam, and maybe a grapple line to be on the safe side, to the _Endeavour_. We drift into the anomaly, and if it fouls up our engines we'll still be tethered to the starship, and Tholiar can drag us back out." She looked at the science officer. "How about it, Sarn? Does that sound workable to you?"

"Yes."

"Then let's do it," decided Drake. "Chief Inogashira, let Mr Grossman and his people know that we're ready to go. Advise them of the plan. Alex, Sarn, you're with me. Susan. You were worried about this mission. Do you want to come as well?"

She shook her head most emphatically. "No! I can't. You shouldn't go, either. Something terrible has happened to that ship. You'll help it grow, help it spread."

He paid her no heed. "I appreciate the warning, Susan, but we have our obligations. Commander Tholiar, the ship is yours. We'll keep in contact. Let's go."

The officers followed Drake into the turbolift.

"_It's a mistake to dismiss her warning,"_ said Kana sternly. _"She knows things that even I don't. If she says there's trouble…"_

"_There's trouble. I'm not dismissing her warning, Kana. Far from it."_

The turbolift came to a halt, far from the shuttle bay. Alex stepped out and flicked a smile back at the others. "I'll meet up with you down there."

"Where are you going, Lieutenant?"

"Just fetching a few things, Will. It won't hold us up any, don't worry."

Since Alex would do exactly what she wanted unless he had a small army to enforce his orders, and arguing would just take time, the captain nodded and let her be on her way. He was rankled, though. He cut Alex a lot of slack, but there were limits to what was acceptable. Wandering off during an important rescue operation was taking things too far. He realised that he should have been firmer, should have hauled her back, or at least found out what was going through that head of hers. But he had spent too many years letting her have her own way, and it was habit now.

I need to break that habit, he told himself. It's bad for discipline, and bad for morale. I let her get away with too much.

The SSAR team wasn't gathered in the shuttle bay when the captain arrived, which annoyed him as well. Grossman was there, and several of his people were boarding the tug, but he was obviously waiting for late arrivals. To his credit, he seemed as irritated by it as the captain was.

"Sir."

"Where's your team, Mr Grossman?"

"On their way, sir."

Unacceptable! They were waiting around not only for Alex, but for the freaking Search and Rescue team as well! What sort of operation was this? What had happened to organisation?

Diego and House arrived a minute later, medical packs slung over their shoulders with the _Endeavour_ mission crest stamped on them; they had been getting extra supplies from sickbay. House automatically drifted over towards Sarn. Although the Vulcan didn't react, she was uncomfortable with his proximity and attention. She knew exactly what about her interested House; the way his eyes kept straying to her chest and legs left no room for interpretation.

She had never felt a pull towards men, and with her relationship to Alex seeming to be evolving in the right direction she definitely wasn't about to change the habits of a lifetime now.

When Alex rejoined her friends, not long after the men from SSAR arrived in the shuttle bay, Sarn went immediately to stand with her. She noticed that the human had changed into her off duty clothes, and that the trousers and cloak were of noticeably tougher material than her usual ones, but it was Drake who noticed the armaments. "Going to war, Lieutenant?"

In addition to the two phase pistols on her hips, she had the particle cannon she had salvage from a derelict alien star cruiser in hand. The cannon was a bulky, roughly tubular weapon, looking something like a half-sized bazooka. It was big, heavy, and designed to vaporise everything in a wide cone in front of it. It was a very serious piece of military kit, and definitely not Starfleet issue.

"Expect the worst, etc, etc." She smiled, quite merrily.

"I don't think we're going to need that."

"Neither do I. But I'd rather have it and not need it."

He really didn't think the cannon was necessary, but she was right to be cautious. Their sensors had utterly failed to tell them what to expect over there. There might be something dangerous enough to warrant the gun; and if there wasn't, it could always be used to clear any obstacles they might encounter.

"And the clothes change?"

Alex shrugged. "I hate the uniform."

The rest of the SSAR personnel had arrived and boarded the tug. Drake really thought that his helmsman should be going over to the _Von Braun_ in uniform, but he wasn't about to waste more time in sending her back to get changed.

"All aboard."

"I think you should help yourself to a gun, Sarn," suggested Alex, as they climbed up the boarding ramp together.

"I do not think I will need one, Alex."

"It would make me feel better."

Sarn did not understand her friend's concern, but she did as she was asked and procured a phase pistol. Alex nodded. "Thanks. It's probably nothing but…"

While the captain went into the cockpit with Grossman and the two pilots, Alex and Sarn sat themselves down on the long bench seat built into the starboard bulkhead. The layout of the tug-shuttle's interior bore a lot in common with the old paratrooper aircraft of the twentieth century: a long central section where the teams sat in two lines, a cockpit at the very front; off one side of the central isle was the miniature engine room, and on the other the cargo bay. Sitting on the benches around Alex and Sarn were SSAR men and women, the security troops wearing battle gear, the medics in their white tunics, and the engineers in dark orange overalls. The two Starfleet officers stood out from the group conspicuously. Some of the SSAR people were whispering about them, making jokes, while Sarn and Alex paid them no mind.

"Susan's warning is concerning you?"

"She would know, wouldn't she? What's going on over there, I mean. Even if the anomaly is making a mess of our sensors, it would have to be something else again to block her telepathy."

"It is not impossible that it is."

Alex sat up. "You're saying she could be imagining things?"

"She has a vivid imagination," Sarn replied. "Especially since you showed her those movies."

"Yeah." Alex scratched the back of her head. "Retrospectively, the monster movie marathon might have been a mistake."

The tug-shuttle eased off the deck and out of the bay. Sarn noticed the way that Alex tensed. Curious. What sort of helmsman was afraid of flying? "Is there something wrong, Alex?"

"What's wrong is that I'm not at the controls," she said. "I don't trust any pilot but me. I'm funny like that."

They felt a vibration through the hull as the grappler connected with the _Endeavour_, securing them to the base ship. With a few taps from the manoeuvring thrusters, the tug began the long, slow fall towards the _Von Braun_. Alex counted the seconds as the thrusters fired, and from the timing and the faint tug of acceleration that the dampeners didn't quite compensate for, she calculated their speed. Slower than Drake might have liked, she was sure, but she respected the pilot for playing it safe. No one liked to go rushing headlong into the unknown.

Well…she did, but she was a bit different to the average person, wasn't she? She had her other self to fall back on if she got into trouble.

"Do you think I should have left my uniform on?"

"It would have been conventional."

"It doesn't suit me, though. You look great in it. I just look wrong." She ran her hands down her cloak. "This is better. This is me."

Her own choice of clothing did look better on Alex than anything else Sarn had seen her wear. She wasn't sure what it was, but Alex only ever looked right when she had her familiar blue trousers and vest, the cloak draped over the top. Uniforms, dress uniforms, formal evening wear, even casual jeans and shirts, none of it sat properly on the helmsman.

But looking right wasn't really the issue. It was what was appropriate for the situation that mattered. "Perhaps you should have left the cloak."

"I like the cloak. You like the cloak. Come on, admit it. You love me for my fashion sense."

"I do not," said Sarn.

"Oh?"

"No. My desire for you stems from another source."

"Oh?" Now Alex was really interested, but Sarn wasn't talking.

"_She can be a real tease when she wants to be,"_ Alex said to her other self.

"_This is no time for jokes,"_

"_Huh? What's up with you?"_ The other Nain's voice had been so sharp and fierce, angrier than Alex had heard her in a long time.

Kana didn't look up; she was in thought. _"I sense it. Stronger now. The darkness that Susan was warning us about. There's something…familiar about it. I've felt this blackness before. But where? And when?"_ She suddenly looked sharply at Alex, frightened earnestness in her eyes. _"I can feel it creeping through us. Reaching out to touch us – both of our souls. It's… Can you feel it, Alex?"_

"_I…no."_ She answered honestly. _"I don't feel anything."_

"_I hope that's a good sign."_

Kana's worrying unnerved Alex more than somewhat. Kana was the most powerful being that Alex had encountered in her life, and she had been to places that no human had ever heard of, seen species that made humanity look like insects in comparison. In all her years of travelling, she had never encountered something that Kana couldn't brush away if she wanted to. No matter the situation, no matter how dire, her other self had always been there, ready to take over; and as soon as she did she instantly took charge of the situation. So often they had faced off against powerful enemies, men and women who had commanded incredible forces of arms, troops, psychic abilities; people who been known and feared and used to being in total control all the time. And Kana would emerge, and the instant she did those enemies would be defeated, the power they had disappearing in an instant.

And now…Kana was scared.

"_Listen, Alex. There is something on that ship. Something more powerful than anything we've encountered before. I can feel it reaching out for us, probing us, studying us."_

"_Why? How?"_

"_I don't know. I just know that it is. It's intrigued by us – all of us – but you and I especially. I can feel it trying to get into my thoughts. Alex, while we are on that ship, I won't be able to help you."_

Alex felt cold, hard dread curl up in her stomach. _"Wh…what?"_

"_I won't be able to take over. I won't risk bringing my mind to the fore, making it easier for that…thing to get in. I should still be able to advise you. With your mind in the front, acting as a buffer, we should be safe. But we might not be. I won't know until we're over there."_

"_I don't understand."_

"_Neither do I. Not fully, not yet. Just trust me, Alex."_

Trusting Kana wasn't a problem; there had never been a time in her life when she hadn't trusted the other presence that dwelt within her. If Kana said that there was something dangerous over there, there was, Alex didn't doubt it. What troubled her was the idea of having to face that danger…alone.

She usually fought her own battles anyway, but she always did so knowing that her other soul was waiting, ready to step in if things went really over her head. Kana was like a safety net. Alex could always throw herself headlong into danger, because her other self was there to bail her out.

This time…

I can handle it, she told herself firmly. Whatever we're heading into, I can handle it. It's not like I'm really alone, anyway, she added, with a fond glance at Sarn. As long as I have my friends with me, there's nothing to worry about.

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Annabelle DeCroix looked on in horror as the tug-shuttle drifted closer and closer. All of her efforts to reach the comm suite had been in vain; the ship wouldn't let her warn the rescuers. And now they were coming, they were nearly here. They would reach the airlock in a few more minutes and they would come aboard, full of hope and good intentions, and Hell would consume them. It was waiting, hungry for them. It needed more victims, more nightmares to make it grow. It had already sucked what it could from the _Von Braun_ crew.

Those SSAR people…fresh dark dreams, fresh horrors, fresh evil. It would feast, for a time.

And then it would send another call, lure more into its trap.

She hammered against the view port and shouted uselessly, begging the tug to turn around and go back. But it was already too late, she knew. Even if they could have heard her, even if they had followed her pleas, it wouldn't matter. They had entered the anomaly now, and so they had entered Hell. It was already inside them, seeking what it wanted, absorbing their dark fantasies and learning from them. Aboard the _Von Braun_, new monstrosities were being spawned.

She had to get to the airlock. If she couldn't warn those poor people over the comm, she could tell them in person when they arrived. If they left quickly enough, maybe they could still escape.

And if they couldn't, they could at least get a signal to that Daedalus-class starship, hanging there just out of Hell's reach. A photonic torpedo would end the nightmare forever.

Her rifle was depleted, useful only as a club, and for the flashlight clipped to its barrel. She used its light to scare back the shadows and crept forward, through the corridor. The fleshy growths that were spreading throughout the ship like a giant bacteria culture were less prominent in this area. Maybe the infection hadn't reached the outer sections yet. Maybe Hell was intentionally keeping this part of the ship clean and clear; make it seem more normal, lure the rescuers away from the safety of their shuttle before trapping them. She would never have entertained such thoughts before; they were irrational, unscientific. But this anomaly had taught her better. It wasn't just an anomaly. It was a living thing. A malicious living thing and it was toying with them all.

She recognised this intersection. To the right should be the airlock, and straight ahead should lead to the crew cabins, she reminded herself. She emphasised each 'should'. Nothing was where it _should_ be right now. The layout of the ship was in constant flux. Even as she turned and walked towards the airlock, she didn't expect to reach it. The door would open onto the arboretum, or the cargo bay, or the torture chamber that had once been the bridge. It would lead to anywhere except where she expected and wanted it to.

The airlock was on the other side of the door.

Annabelle was so stunned that she momentarily forgot about the dangers that were so prevalent aboard ship. She stepped into the airlock without first checking for traps or creatures hiding in wait.

She was safe, but only because the danger was creeping up from behind.

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"Ladies first," said Alex Nain, stepped around Ensign House so that she could be the first off the tug. Kana's warnings echoed in her mind as she stepped into the airlock, and she swung the particle cannon into her hands, clicking off its safety catch. Despite her friend's dire talk, she wasn't particularly scared anymore; she was more excited than anything; excited to see what could be so bad that it perturbed the unshakable Kana Nain.

Captain Drake tried to take a place next to her, but Alex discretely pushed him back. She would be at the front when they went aboard. She had the biggest gun.

"Open the airlock," instructed the captain. Alex worked the controls, the lock cycled, and the _Von Braun_'s inner door chugged open.

"Get back!" Screeched a voice, even as the panels began to part. "Get back! Go away! It's not safe!"

Two people in the tug-shuttle recognised the voice instantly, and the captain spoke faster: "Annabelle!"

"Will! Alex! Oh no!" She was stricken, her eyes wide and horrified. Her uniform tunic was dirty, stained with sweat and blood, her eyes were bloodshot, she looked like she hadn't slept in days, and her arms and face were bruised. What had she been through?

"It's all right," said Drake, forcing his way past Alex to get to his lover. "We're here now. What happened?"

"No! Get away. Get off this ship, Will, right now! There's no time to –"

A primal roar from somewhere behind her cut the rest of what Annabelle had been about to say short. Reacting instinctively, Alex grabbed her friend by the back of his jacket and pulled him towards her. He stumbled back, as a great claw slashed out of the darkness, grabbing up Annabelle. She screamed and hit it with her rifle, but the weapon's butt glanced off harmlessly against the bony claw.

"Annabelle!" Shouted Drake desperately, trying to go to her rescue. But Alex grabbed him again and threw him to the ground. He was unarmed; there was nothing that he could do against whatever had got Annabelle. She vaulted his body and ran at the creature, dropping her cannon, letting it hang from its shoulder strap, and drawing her two phase pistols. Annabelle was still thrashing, her rifle waving around wildly. Briefly, the torch beam fell on the thing holding her, and Alex suddenly understood why Kana had been frightened.

The thing that had grabbed Annabelle could only be described as a monster. It was a hideous, scuttling thing out of a nightmare, with a centipede-like main body, a humanoid torso on top, gorilla-like arms that ended in clawed hands, and a pair of little round heads on its shoulder. Each head had two wide, narrow orange eyes, and a gaping maw of a mouth; no nose that Alex could see, and little holes in the side of the skull that had to be ears. The thing's skin was pale as a corpse's, rough and leathery, scarred in several places.

"Let her go!" Alex shouted at it.

The creature hissed at her and took a step forward, raising its other claw. Annabelle howled again. Alex brought up her phase pistols, aiming at each of the monster's heads. She squeezed the triggers, stopping just short of firing when a sudden fear entered her mind: if she decapitated the monster its claws might spasm and lock closed, cutting Annabelle in half. Drake would never forgive her if Annabelle were hurt, whether it was her fault or not. She shifted her aim and fired.

The monstrosity screeched as its left claw shattered in an explosion of bone and gore. It wobbled on its feet, throwing both arms wide and smacking Annabelle against a wall as a result, but thankfully it didn't tighten its grip on her. She was still safe.

Alex fired again, taking out one of the thing's legs. It quickly shifted its balance to the remaining legs and then, faster than she would have given such a massive beast credit for, it turned and ran.

"Oh no you fucking don't!" Shouted Alex, taking off in hot pursuit. She heard Drake, Sarn and the SSAR people running after her, but she was much lighter on her feet, much faster, and she left them behind.

Fast as she was, the thing carrying Annabelle was faster still; Alex could see it disappearing into the darkness of the corridor. Annabelle's torch was getting further and further away. She wanted to try shooting. A lucky shot could bring the bastard down, but an unlucky one might kill Annabelle. She couldn't risk it. So she dug into her reserves and ran faster, managing to close the gap just enough to see the thing duck through a door. A science lab, according to the label. Alex followed.

She skidded to a stop in a room that definitely wasn't a science lab; it was a cargo bay. She didn't pay that much attention – someone had got the door signs wrong, big deal. The monster had been joined by another now. The wounded one was keeping to the back, while the fresh creature advanced on Alex.

She fired both phase pistols, relieving the creature of both of its heads. As the large body crashed down, and the first creature wailed for its dead mate, Alex fired again; using the phase pistols as cutting weapons. Two streams of bright pink energy cut into the first thing's arm, and Alex sliced it off. The severed arm, and Annabelle, hit the floor heavily; the monster stumbled to the left, screeching pitifully and bleeding bountifully from its wound.

Annabelle had been shocked and stunned by the creature's grabbing her, but now that she was free her brain got back into gear. She wriggled free of the severed claw and ran to Alex's side. The helmsman had holstered her phase pistols and now had the particle cannon back in her hands. The monster was wailing and screaming, enraged and agonised. It was starting to get its balance back, and eyes full of murderous hate turned on Alex.

She braced the particle gun against her shoulder and fired. The cone of white light enveloped most of the humanoid torso of the monster, and everything it touched was blown out of existence. The centipede section of the monster slammed into the floor.

Wordlessly, Alex grabbed Annabelle's wrist and dragged her to the door. She was going to get Drake's girlfriend back to the safety of the tug, right now.

The door opened, but not onto the corridor that Alex had come through. At first, Alex thought the door had opened onto the throat of a giant; the hallway was entirely coated with moist pink flesh that rippled and squelched, very definitely alive. It looked like a huge oesophagus, but she could see bits of corridor where the flesh hadn't quite taken over, a door here and there, a conduit, a piece of Starfleet technology. It was a _Von Braun_ corridor, but with flesh growing over it.

Not the same corridor. And there was no sign of Drake, or anyone else.

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Captain Drake and the SSAR team saw Alex run into one of the science labs. They were twenty yards behind her, and losing ground. Damn she was fast! Drake hadn't known how quickly his friend could move.

He hoped that she wouldn't do anything stupid. Annabelle's life was on the line, and Alex's way of acting without thinking could get her killed! He had to get there; he had to contain her impulsiveness if he could.

The door was right there. It opened as he approached, and the captain charged into…the shuttle bay? How had that happened? He knew the layout of these ships; the shuttle bay was nowhere near the airlock.

He turned around. Sarn would have an explanation.

Sarn wasn't there.

No one was.


	8. Chapter 8

_**Chapter Eight**_

"No!"

The scream had come out of nowhere. Commander Tholiar turned the comfortable command chair to look at its source. Susan was standing nearby, clutching her head as though it was hurting. There was sweat on her brow, and the little girl was trembling.

"Susan?"

She opened her eyes and looked up, terrified. "It's happened to them. They…"

"What has happened, Susan?"

"They're trapped. It has them."

"What has them?"

"I…the evil thing. It has them! The ship! It has the ship, and it used it to lure them in. Now it has them."

Tholiar frowned. "Are you talking about our away team?"

"Yes!"

"Mr Green, sensor scan, please. Status of the SAR team?"

The science officer leant over his instruments, muttering something about hysterical children on the bridge. The scan results ran across his screen and he frowned. "Unknown, Commander."

"What do you mean 'unknown'?"

"I can't read their life signs."

"You had them a moment ago."

"Yes," he said impatiently. He had never been good at tolerating criticism, and especially not from a jumped up alien. "I did. But I've lost them now."

"Are they dead?"

"I – "

"No," said Susan. She had her eyes closed, her attention focused on her psychic senses. She sounded no calmer. "They're alive. It wants them alive. For now."

"Oh, what? The 'evil thing'?" Sneered Green. "Sensors can't confirm _any_ life signs over there, Commander."

"Lieutenant Sarn reported intermittent life signs earlier."

Green snorted. "Well, yeah. But those could just be sensor echoes."

"It's the living force of the anomaly. It has a mind and a heart and a hunger. It wants our people for their nightmares. When it has absorbed them all, it will kill them."

Green had had more than enough of Susan's eerie warnings. As well as aliens, he wasn't that fond of Augments, and he loudly demanded, "Will someone get her off the bridge?"

"Be silent, Mr Green," snapped Tholiar. She looked over at the other side of the bridge. "Communications, can you raise anyone on the _Von Braun_?"

"Hailing, sir. _Endeavour_ to Captain Drake. This is the _Starship Endeavour_ calling Captain Drake. Please respond, Captain." He repeated the message several times before Tholiar suggested he try someone else. "Lieutenant Nain, please respond. _Endeavour_ to Lieutenant Nain. Alex, do you hear me? Doctor Sarn, come in. Doctor Sarn?"

Tholiar looked at Susan and offered, "Let me guess, it doesn't want us to talk to our shipmates?"

Susan shook her head.

The Andorian woman considered the situation carefully. The away team was lost aboard the _Von Braun_, out of contact. They had no way of telling if any of them were still alive, apart from Susan's reassurance – and how accurate was that? She could send in a second team, using one of the ship's shuttles (they had monitored the tug's approach to the _Von Braun_ and now knew that the anomaly had no affect on a ship's engines) but it was likely that whatever fate had befallen the captain would claim them as well.

What was going on over there? The only theory she currently had was Susan's crazy 'evil thing'. She would have preferred something a little more scientific.

"Keep scanning, Mr Green. I want to know what's going on over there."

"Yeah, you and me both," he agreed.

She pressed one of the comm buttons on her chair's armrest. "All hands, now hear this. This is the first officer. Yellow alert. All personnel to standby stations. I repeat, yellow alert."

Around the ship, security teams were being deployed to critical locations, weapons and defensive systems were being brought online, and key operational components were being safeguarded against every known threat. The _Endeavour_ was gearing up for trouble.

Tholiar just hoped that she wouldn't have to call red alert, because if she did it meant the away team was as good as dead.

Maybe Susan's dire predictions were getting to her, but if the _Endeavour_ came under attack, she would order the immediate destruction of the _Von Braun_.

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"What the hell is going on around here?" Demanded Alex Nain, coldly.

"Don't point that phase pistol at me," whimpered Annabelle.

"_There are times when death threats are appropriate and effective. This isn't one of them. She's too scared as it is. Frighten her more and she will simply snap. It's a wonder that she hasn't already."_

Alex's first impulse was to tell Kana to shut up, but she checked herself in time. It was this ship, this Hell aboard it; it was getting to her, making her edgy. She had lost all contact with the rest of the team. They weren't in the corridor, and none of them had arrived to join her in the cargo bay. She had tried contacting them over the communicator, but there was nothing but static.

"_Can you sense our friends?"_

"_I can't risk using my senses, Alex. This is the darkness I warned you about. It's trying to get into our minds. I can't risk giving it an opening that it could use."_

Alex hadn't wanted to hear any of that. 'Yes, Alex, our friends are fine' is what she had been hoping for. She wanted to tell Kana to damn her caution and search for them, but her other self was right. There was something aboard this ship that went beyond the monsters. She could feel it now, creeping inside her skull. She knew it wasn't her imagination. A lifetime with Kana had made her sensitive to such things.

Annabelle looked like she might cry at any moment. She was a buddle of nerves. She needed a long period of rest and recovery in a quiet place. The kindest thing to do to her right now would be to sedate her until she could be got aboard the _Endeavour_. But she had survived aboard this nightmare of a ship for this long already, and she knew things that Alex needed to.

She holstered the phase pistol. "Annabelle, I'm not going to hurt you," she said soothingly, "but I need you to tell me what's happening around here. What's happened to the ship? Where did those…_things_ come from?"

"I…" she swallowed. "I don't know. The anomaly, I think. There's more to it, but…but I don't understand. I don't have the answers!"

"That's okay. That's okay. Tell me how your ship came to be stuck here."

"We went looking for the anomaly. We saw it on long-range sensors, wanted to understand it."

"I understand that. But why did you go _inside_ it?"

"He did it," Annabelle whimpered. She grabbed Alex's arm, her eyes wide with fright. "He did it."

"Who's 'he'?"

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"Doctor Lionel Corvis."

"Captain William Drake, _Starship Endeavour_." He helped the man to his feet.

"Thank you, Captain, thank you. I was beginning to give up hope. You got our distress signal?"

"Yes."

"Excellent, excellent." He rubbed his narrow chin thoughtfully, slim blue eyes gazing off into the distance. "The signal made it through the spatial turbulence. That's good. It doesn't have a subspace dampening effect."

"It didn't, but it certainly seems to now."

"How do you mean?"

"We received your distress call, but when we got here and tried to hail your ship there was no response."

"Oh? No? Well, that can be easily explained. Things aren't in a good way here, Captain." He laughed, a laugh that was just this side of madness. "You might have seen that for yourself."

"Yes, I'd noticed," said Drake, narrowing his eyes.

"Probably there's no one on the bridge. Probably there isn't a bridge anymore."

"What do you mean by that?"

"It's reshaping the ship. Getting rid of what was, bringing in the new. It's responsible, you know. For the rearrangement. For the creatures, and the other things."

"What other things?"

Corvis wagged a finger. "Just…everything. It did all this. Quite remarkable, in its way."

Drake grabbed him by the front of his jacket and rammed him up against the side of a shuttlepod. The scientist was tall, taller than the captain at six foot three, but he was skinny and had no muscle, and Drake manhandled him easily. He showed no surprise, no fear; his thin blue eyes just watched the captain with a kind of detached interest. Drake was suddenly certain that Corvis' mind had snapped long ago.

"This 'remarkable' thing," he spat, "has separated me from my shipmates. My friend went chasing one of those creatures down a corridor and now she's gone."

"I told you, Captain; the anomaly reshapes the ship. Doors lead to different places. Everything's in constant flux. How do you think I ended up in that conduit? I was trying to make my way to the escape pods, but every route I took led me back here. I don't think it wants me to leave."

"You make it sound alive."

"Oh, I think it is. A new kind of consciousness, Captain. A vast space-dwelling life form."

"Bullshit," opined Drake.

"You have a counter-theory?" Snapped back Corvis and his eyes were suddenly very hard. "No, no, no? Then listen, Captain. It is alive. Like all living things it thinks, it feels, it grows. You said that you received our distress call, but that now your communicators aren't working? See? Signs of evolution, of change. It has learnt how to isolate us."

"And why would 'it' want to do that?"

Corvis withdrew into himself once again. His speech was that of a madman. "It feeds, Captain. It feeds! Like everything it has a hunger. It feeds on our fears. Looks deep into our souls and conjures what we are most afraid of. The things that went bump in the night when we were children. The nightmares that never left us. You've seen them already, wandering the ship."

Drake had no time for these ramblings. Corvis was clearly insane, and no wonder with what had happened to the _Von Braun_. He felt sorry for the man, but there was nothing that he could do for him now. He released his grip, and the lanky man slid down the pod and flopped onto the floor. He was chuckling quite crazily, while his thin eyes kept an unblinking watch on the captain.

"I have to find my team. Stay out of sight. I'll come back for you."

"Oh, there's no need for that, Captain. I'm quite safe." He grinned. "I wonder what it'll make for you. I wonder what you fear."

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"Corvis took a shuttle into the phenomena," Annabelle continued. "Our scans were getting nowhere. He was impatient, he wanted to understand it. But the captain wouldn't permit us to get any closer. Smart man. Corvis argued with him, but he was firm. So he took a shuttle from the bay and flew into the anomaly himself."

Alex and Kana were both regarding her with the same troubled expression, thinking the same thing: Damned fool!

"He came out an hour later. He seemed so serene. He told us that he had seen…beautiful things." She cried. "He told us it was heaven!"

"So you went in to see for yourself?"

"_Idiots,"_ said Kana unsympathetically.

But Annabelle shook her head. "It wasn't like that. Most of us didn't believe him. The captain certainly didn't. He ordered that we maintain position. I…I thought that would make Corvis angry, but it didn't. He…nothing seemed to bother him anymore. He was a man at peace. Well…he seemed to be, anyway. Now…"

"You think what he experienced in the shuttle drove him mad," provided Alex. "And he decided that he would share his insanity with his friends."

"Yes. That's what happened. He managed to get to the helm controls. Drove us into the anomaly. The…the monsters started appearing almost at once! I…" she shook. "I…"

Alex took Annabelle's hand and squeezed it softly. "It's all right. Put it out of your mind. I'm here now. I'll protect you. I promise."

"You can't."

"I'm really good with this gun," smiled Alex, patting the barrel of the particle cannon.

"No!" Annabelle's eyes were hysterical. "It's not about guns. It…it gets into your head. It knows what you fear, and it makes you face it."

"_Of course!"_ Exclaimed Kana, as though the whole thing were perfectly obvious.

Alex had worked it out at the same time as her other self. "The monsters aren't aliens, are they? They're the products of over-active imaginations made flesh."

Annabelle blinked. "Yes. You…you sound so calm about it."

Alex shrugged. "Seen it before. It's an old trick. Usually it's done with smoke and mirrors; this is the first time I've seen a real higher power at work, but it's the same difference. And if the monsters are real that just makes them easier to handle."

"What? How?"

"Smoke and mirrors don't bleed when you blast them."

Still holding onto Annabelle's hand, she headed for the door. It didn't open onto the flesh-covered corridor this time; on the other side was a standard crew cabin: box of a room, bed carved into a wall, a desk and a chair, a few personal artefacts to identify it as someone's. Alex stepped into it and found the occupant, a young blond woman, in two pieces by the foot of the bed. She closed her eyes for a second, silently giving the young woman last rites. There was nothing else to do.

"Did you know her?" Alex asked.

Annabelle didn't answer. She wasn't there.

"Great," she grumbled. "Will's gonna kill me when he learns I lost her. Okay, Kana…"

"_Yes?"_

"Time we ended this. We should get to the bridge."

"_Or the engine room,"_ suggested Kana. _"But how do we get there? Annabelle said the ship is fractured."_

"No. What she said is that the doors don't lead where they should. That's interesting, isn't it? If this was some random phenomenon it shouldn't be limited to rooms. Surely you'd have fractures bisecting rooms, the bridge merging with hydroponics or something. That's not happening. It's very localised."

"_Good point. Convenient, isn't it?"_

"Far too convenient. And you and Susan have been sensing a malicious force ever since we left Earth. Annabelle was saying that this place gets into your head and plucks out your fears. This _anomaly_ is the thing you've been sensing."

"_No. I don't think so."_

Alex nodded, her logic taking another track. "No, you're right. The anomaly isn't it. Not by itself. There's something else, isn't there? Another force at work that's guiding this thing."

"_I think so."_

"Corvis?"

"_Maybe."_ She didn't sound convinced.

"He's got a part in this," Alex insisted.

"_No argument. But one human isn't strong enough to do all this. Unless he's like you."_

Alex could only think of one thing that made her stand apart from the rest of the human race, and if she had that in common with Corvis then they were in even bigger trouble than she had though. "A host?"

"_Not what I meant. If he has your mental strength, or more…but even then it's hard to imagine him being able to do all this."_

"Ah, hell. You mean if I shoot him that won't solve everything?"

"_Only one way to be certain."_

"Right. Let's go kill Corvis. Just out of curiosity, if I'm wrong that'll make…what? Fourteen?"

"_Fifteen."_

"Huh? Bovary was a grey area."

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"Doctor? Hey, Doc? Are you all right?"

The words sounded so small, so far away. Petty and inconsequential. She swatted at their source and he jumped back, raising his hands, something between surprise and a smile on his face. "Woah! Easy, Doc, easy. You don't look so good. You got a fever or something?"

A fever? Yes. She could feel it percolating through her, the blood fever. It was still in its earliest stages, she could still fight down its affects with her strongest disciplines, but not for much longer. She could feel it gathering, feel her mental guards collapsing even now as her powerful, buried emotions were brought raging to the surface.

_Pon farr_.

She hated it. _Hated_ it. She had gone through the fever five times in her life already, and each time it seemed to be worse, stronger, more consuming. In a few years time she would have to suffer its agonies for a sixth time, and already she dreaded that occurrence.

Humans called the _pon farr_ the Vulcan mating drive. If only that were true, it would be so much easier! She enjoyed sex, and if the _pon farr_ were just an excuse to spend a few days in bed with her girlfriend she wouldn't be complaining. But it wasn't. It was also the release of all that was base and primal and vicious in her, all of the darkest bits that made up the Vulcan soul, and there was plenty of blackness in there. A blanket of rough negativity smothered her intellect and logic, and all of the kinder characteristics and emotions that she cherished.

"Doc?" House was clutching her arms, trying to get through to her.

Sarn threw him from her. He slammed into the corridor bulkhead hard enough to wind himself. She paced towards him; her hands clenched, her eyes wide and staring, spittle foaming on her lips, and she roared, "Go away! Leave me alone! Or I will kill you."


	9. Chapter 9

_**Chapter Nine**_

"Easy, easy. I'm Doctor Hilary Pratchett, Starfleet Search and Rescue. Easy. This is Chattaway and S'jek."

There were four men in red engineering jumpsuits, all of them armed, one with a phase pistol and the others with tools. They were all desperate and exhausted. They had been huddling in an empty medical storeroom, hiding from the monsters that roved the ship. A smart move, although the three SSAR people had already found evidence of other people who had attempted the same thing and hadn't got away with it.

The engineers raised their weapons. "Back off!"

"Take it easy! We're not here to hurt you. We just want to help."

"You can help by going away! We're not safe with you here."

"You'll make the monsters come," added another.

Hilary shook her head. "Safety in numbers, right?"

"No, no, no, no!" He clutched his head, as though something were trying to force its way out.

"Big groups draw the monsters," the lead engineer said. "We tried before, when they first appeared. Safety in numbers, just like you said. But it just makes them come. They can tell, they can always tell!"

Hilary had seen some of the monsters roaming the ship since she had lost contact with the rest of the team. They didn't seem particularly intelligent to her, or very gifted with their senses. They had ignored her and her teammates and just let them walk right past.

"How can they tell?"

"I don't know! They just can. What does it matter how?"

"It might be important. If we know how they're finding us we'll know better how to hide."

"We already know how to hide! Stay in small groups, out of sight. It works. Now go away!"

The engineer with the phase pistol pointed it at her chest. "Go away, or we'll kill you."

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Alex Nain considered her position. She had stepped out of the dead girl's cabin and found herself in a corridor with fleshy growths spreading across the bulkheads. They grew as she watched; a virus that was slowly taking over the ship. The fleshy growths oozed puss and mucus, which dripped onto the bare metal grate floor and onto the exposed pipes beneath. She was down on the lower engineering decks, somewhere near the sewage treatment plant, judging from the intense and foul odour. Unless that was the fleshy gunk at work.

"_I wonder what this stuff is,"_ she asked her other self.

Kana shrugged. _"Deeply unpleasant."_

"_It's got to come from somewhere. Is this a natural by-product of this anomaly, or did someone dream it up?"_

"_It could be either. If it is someone's nightmare all I can tell you is that it's not mine."_

"_Or mine."_

Kana looked at her curiously. _"What do you fear, anyway?"_

Alex blinked, unprepared for that particular question. _"Huh? Why do you ask?"_

"_Just curious, and this seems a good time to ask. We're surrounded by nightmares, aren't we? Appropriate. So, what frightens you?"_

"_Nothing. I'm fearless. Okay, let's talk about something else."_

Kana wasn't about to let it drop. _"Everyone's afraid of something. Spiders, the dark, dogs, nuclear war; there's a fear for everyone."_

"_Okay. There is something that scares me,"_ the human admitted._ "What about you? What does the great Kana Nain fear?"_

The second Nain was more honest than the first, more willing to talk. _"Losing you. Your turn."_

Alex ignored her other soul's comment. _"Okay, let's work out how we can get to the bridge."_

"_How are you going to do that? Keep going through doors until you get there?"_

She had been giving the matter a great deal of thought and she shared it with Kana now. _"No. That would probably take forever. If there is a sinister force at work here I'll bet you anything that it'll do whatever it can to keep us away from where we want to go."_

"_So…?"_

"_So, I don't want to go to the bridge, do I? I've always wondered what the stellar cartography bay on a ship like this might look like."_

She stepped through the nearest door.

"_Well,"_ said Kana, folding her arms across her chest. _"Now you know."_

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The engineer went to shoot but Chattaway was faster. He was a trained security officer, he had been stationed aboard Earth Base Four during the Romulan War, and although he had never seen action against Romulan soldiers (no one had) there had been a fair amount of trouble on the station during those years. He had his pulse rifle in his hands, and when he saw that Doctor Pratchett was being threatened his response was instinctive and immediate; he swung the rifle up and fired.

The bolt of blue-white energy made a bloody crater out of the man's chest. The phase pistol fell out of his grip and for a moment he reached spasmodically for his wound, as though trying to hold his insides in. The security officer hadn't had time to reset his weapon from fighting the monsters at large in the ship; the bolt had been set to kill.

"No!" Screamed Pratchett.

The other terrified engineers lunged at Chattaway. One of them swung a hyperspanner at his head. He blocked the attack, using his pulse rifle as a shield, and lashed out with a fist, catching the man on the side of the jaw. He was knocked back, getting in the way of his two friends, blocking their advance and giving S'jek enough time to reset his pulse rifle to stun. The thin black and white striped Dedderac swept his rifle around and fire a single shot into each of the engineers, putting them to sleep.

The three SSAR people stayed tensed for a moment, half expecting the engineers to spring back to their feet and try again, but they didn't move. S'jek put a hand on Chattaway's shoulder. "Are you all right?"

"Better than him." He nodded at the dead man and carefully reset his weapon to stun.

Pratchett wrenched the weapon from him. "What happened there?"

"You saw for yourself, Doctor. He was going to shoot you."

"He was scared."

"Scared or not, a phase pistol shot at point-blank range would kill you."

She knew that, of course. Even set to stun, a phase beam shot was deadly at close range. The soldier's actions had saved her life, but the cost had been higher than she would have liked. She looked at the other three engineers. "What about them?"

"They were in the safety zone, they're just stunned."

"I know. We should do something for them."

S'jek asked, "Such as?"

Chattaway shook his head. "He's right. When they wake up they'll probably just attack us again."

"We can't just leave them here," the doctor snapped. "If one of those things finds them like this…"

The security officers nodded. They had a duty to protect those people, even if they had tried to attack them before. Chattaway said, "All right. We'll set up defensive positions around the door. S'jek, help me pull those tool boxes into place; we can use them as cover."

They hunkered down beside the boxes and reset their weapons to kill again. If one of the monsters attacked they didn't want to wound it or render it unconscious, they wanted to make sure it was dead. Pratchett took a moment to check on the status of the engineers, relieved to find that they were just unconscious. She had been worried that the security officers had been wrong and the shots had been fatal.

While she was checking their pulses she heard something, something shuffling, _beneath_ the deck plates.

She leapt to her feet, backing up. "S'jek, Chattaway! It's underneath the –"

The deck plates burst open and a bull-like monstrosity began to claw its way out, roaring at them. The Starfleet officers stepped back in fright. They quickly overcame their fear and advanced on the beast, raising and firing their weapons as they did so, pumping round after round of phased energy into the creature. It screamed and wailed as the energy lances tore holes in its flesh and organs, but it didn't go down. Not right away. It managed to pull itself free from the deck plates and roared again, barrelling down on S'jek. The Dedderac just managed to get out of the way in time to avoid being crushed.

Chattaway shot a hole through one of the creature's legs, spraying the wall with blood. The monster stumbled and then lunged at him, too fast for him to get out of the way in time. He stuck his rifle between the monster's horns and his body. It gouged, wrenching the rifle from his hands but doing him no real damage. He ducked and rolled, scooping up a hyperspanner from one of the scattered toolkits on the floor. When the creature came at him again, he struck it hard in the head, splitting the skin right the way down to the bone. The monster screamed horribly and stumbled backwards, dazed.

A phase beam stabbed into the bull's head, between the eyes, and killed it instantly. The colossal body toppled and Chattaway was just able to roll out of its way in time to avoid being crushed to death. He was sore and panting, exhausted, breathing difficult in this humid atmosphere, but he pulled himself upright and stood with his spanner raised and ready to strike. Pratchett and S'jek were at his side in a moment, their phase weapons ready.

They gaped at the figure in the doorway.

"Hi."

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"Annabelle?"

"Will! Oh, thank God." She wrapped her arms around him and cried into his shoulder. "Thank God!"

"Annabelle." He stroked her hair, tangled and matted with sweat and dirt. "It's okay. It's okay. You're all right now."

"I was so worried. When Alex disappeared I was left all on my own again. I…"

"Alex disappeared?"

Annabelle nodded. "She went through a door. I followed her, but she wasn't where I was."

Drake had experienced that for himself already and he nodded, trying not to worry. Alex was a tough person, probably the toughest of all of them. She had survived for years alone in the roughest parts of space; she could handle herself. And she had the particle cannon, which would make short work of any monsters she came across. She was probably in a better position than he was.

At least Annabelle was okay.

That was even more important.

"We'll find her and we'll get out of here," he promised.

Somehow.

He took Annabelle's hand, his phase pistol in the other. "This way."

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"_This is interesting."_

Kana looked over her shoulder. _"What?"_

"_The sensor arrays are still online. Take a look."_

She pressed a button and the great view screen at the far end of the room lit up. Kana looked at the display, not a direct feed from any of the sensors but a graphic depicting the space around the ship using data gathered from them all. It was badly distorted, the anomaly obviously affecting sensor resolution, but she could see what had intrigued Alex. _"Other ships."_

"_Quite a few of them. We're not the only fly."_

"_It's a spider web now?"_

Alex shrugged. _"Sure, why not? It's caught us and wants to kill us. I think the analogy is apt. But what's more interesting than those ships is the debris I'm picking up. It looks like there were yet more starships trapped here, and that they blew up."_

"_Destroyed by the anomaly?"_

Alex shook her head. _"No, I don't think so. It's not doing anything to damage the ship's hull or systems, if you don't count that bio-sludge. Even that isn't dangerous. And the other ships out there aren't damaged. Except for one thing, and this I think is really interesting. All of the ships have blown out engines. Warp, impulse, thrusters, all gone."_

"_Interesting,"_ Kana agreed. _"And we know that the anomaly doesn't do anything to affect engines."_

"_Nope. So that means…"_

"_Sabotage. The crews of all these ships blew up their own drives."_

Alex Nain nodded. _"That's what I think. They chose to sacrifice themselves so that none of their nightmares could spread. Quite heroic, really."_

"_Yes. Of course, we've buggered that up here, haven't we?"_

"_Huh? How?"_

"_Oh, simple enough. We brought that shuttle, didn't we?"_

Alex swore as she understood what her friend was getting at. The _Von Braun_ and those other ships probably all had shuttlecraft of their own, but since most shuttles didn't even have proper impulse engines they were useless, the creatures couldn't use them to spread. But the SSAR tug-shuttle had both impulse and warp drive. With it, Hell could spread as far as it wanted.

And then an even worse thought occurred to her.

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"Commander," said Lieutenant Brok. "Targeting sensors detect shuttles launching from the _Von Braun_ bay. The tug-shuttle's detaching as well."


	10. Chapter 10

_**Chapter Ten**_

"Destroy them!" Susan begged. "Blow them up. Do it right now!"

"Susan," said Tholiar gently, "those are our ships. Our people."

"No they're not!" The Augment gripped Tholiar's wrist desperately, her little fingers digging into the Andorian woman's flesh. "They're monsters. Blow them up! Launch torpedoes!"

Green couldn't stand children at the best of times and he shouted, "Shut up, you brat!"

"You idiot!" Susan shot back. "You tiny little idiot!"

And then she was suddenly gone from Tholiar's side. The girl squirmed up through the bridge rail and dashed around the upper deck to the tactical control panel. Before Brok could stop her, her fingers expertly found the photonic torpedo controls.

"No!" Barked Brok, trying to stop her, but it was too late.

Torpedo tube one discharged its deadly load. A bright yellow star raced from the _Endeavour_'s spherical main hull and exploded amongst the _Von Braun_ shuttles, vaporising three of them and pulverising the other one into rubble.

The officers stared aghast at what had been done. Susan paid them no mind, her little hands reaching for the phase cannon controls to finish off the tug-shuttle. This time, Brok was quick enough to stop her. He closed his big hands around her wrists and pulled her away from the control console. Shook her and shouted, "What have you done?"

"We have to do more! We have to kill all of them!"

"Those are our people!"

"Idiot!"

And suddenly Brok wasn't on the bridge anymore. He found himself standing on a ledge in the middle of a snowstorm, mountains rising up all around him, cutting the sky off from view. He felt the wind whip through his thin uniform, and although he came from an arctic world with he still shivered bitterly. Icy droplets of snow were falling on his exposed hands and hairless head. He could feel his flesh freeze where the snow touched him.

This is a trick, he told himself. She's put it into my mind somehow.

Try as he might, he couldn't dispel the illusion. He was trapped in the world of snow and ice that Susan had created in his mind.

Free of Brok's grip, Susan leapt at the tactical console again. Ensign Hoskins tried to intercept her and she lashed out with her psychic powers again. The engineer missed his lunge, his world suddenly disappearing into blackness as she blocked the signals between his eyes and his brain. His head struck against the bridge rail and he lay on the deck moaning.

Susan scrabbled up into Brok's empty chair and jabbed at the phase cannon controls, bring the weapons on line, targeting the tug, charging the firing coils…

Tholiar shot her in the back with a phase pistol.

Brok found himself shivering on the bridge. Susan's little body was lying sprawled by his chair. He checked her pulse. She was just stunned.

"Get her to the brig," Tholiar ordered, holstering her phase pistol again. "I want her completely isolated from the rest of the crew. Lock her in a cell then remove all of the security forces from the brig area. Seal off that whole section. No one is to go near her until further notice."

"Aye, Commander."

He passed the unconscious Augment to two of the bridge security officers and they carried her into a turbolift. Brok hoped that she didn't wake up before they had her contained, now that he knew what she could do with her psychic abilities. He also hoped that she could not reach his mind from the brig. That snowstorm she had plunged him into…it had felt so real. So perfect. Every flake of snow had burnt his skin, the wind had ripped through him right to the core, and he had utterly believed it. He still expected to see patches of raw, red, frozen skin when he glanced at his hands, but they were perfectly fine.

She hadn't meant to hurt him, he was sure of that. She had just wanted to disable him, force him to let her go and keep him from getting in her way. What could she have done to him if she had meant to kill?

"Mr Brok, tactical report," requested Commander Tholiar, getting her bridge crew to focus on their jobs, to put the disturbance of the past couple of minutes behind them.

"The _Von Braun_'s shuttles are all destroyed," he said unhappily. "The tug-shuttle is still on approach."

"Are they hailing us?"

Tucker checked his boards. "No, sir."

That was strange, thought Tholiar. The occupants of that tug had just seen the ship fire a photonic torpedo that had obliterated the other shuttles, and not only had they not altered their approach they hadn't attempted to contact the ship. That wasn't right.

"Hail them."

"Hailing now, sir." After a minute he said that line that Tholiar had already heard from the comm officer so many times that mission. "No response, sir."

"Sensor scans, Mr Green."

"What for? They're obviously our people."

She didn't try to keep the anger out of her voice. "Sensor scans, Mr Green."

"Fine, fine." He prodded the console into action. "Scanning. Huh? Wait…those aren't human bio-signs."

"The shuttle's picking up speed," said Ensign Hill, navigation officer.

"Mr Brok, disable that vessel."

Susan had already programmed the phase cannons to lock target on the tug, all he had to do was press fire. As he jabbed the red button he wondered whose mind she had pulled the knowledge necessary to work this console from. His?

Pink streams of light stabbed into the tug-shuttle, but it was built to survive all kinds of assaults. Its shields flashed and successfully repelled the starship's blasts. Its impulse engines fired and it accelerate hard at them.

"They're on a collision course!" Warned Hill. "Too close for evasives."

"Shields to full. Fire again, Mr Brok."

The second volley pierced the tug's shields and obliterated its cockpit, but it was too late. The _Endeavour_ lurched violently and alarms began to blare. Tholiar pulled herself to her feet, using the command chair as an aid. The main lighting was down, either damaged or because the power had been rerouted to more essential systems. She could hear crewmen moaning softly, and in the dim light cast from control panels she could see medical and damage control personnel getting to work. "Report."

"The tug crashed into the forward hull before the shields came up," said Brok. "Deck five section thirteen. Emergency force fields are in place and holding. Damage control parties have been dispatched."

"Have Inogashira send a security detail as well. Damage report."

"We have a hull breach, obviously," said Green. "The tug wreckage is plugging the gap for now. Primary power is offline above deck five – the tug hit one of our EPS lines. We've also lost access to the secondary computer core."

"Casualty report."

"We haven't received one yet."

Tholiar frowned. "The medical teams should be there by now."

"They should, but they haven't sent any word to us."

"Tucker, get in touch with those medics."

He tried his controls and shook his head helplessly. "They aren't responding, sir."

What was going on now? Tholiar wondered. First the _Von Braun_ wouldn't talk to them, and then they had lost contact with the away team, and now this!

Then a new set of alarms went off and she knew her problems had just been added to.

"The intruder alert."

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"They rammed my ship!"

He and Annabelle had ended up at a view port on the _Von Braun_'s observation deck, and a part of him believed that whatever was behind this Hell had intentionally put them there so that he could see his ship being attacked.

He hadn't understood when the _Endeavour_ had fired on the _Von Braun_'s escaping shuttles. He had worried that the monsters had already spread to the starship and were using its weapons to slaughter the survivors trying to escape from the _Von Braun_. But he had it the wrong way around, he saw that now. Tholiar had realised that the shuttles were dangerous and she had shot them down to try and protect the _Endeavour_. She had been too slow to destroy the tug, though.

"They want to escape," said Annabelle and she sounded apologetic, as though this was all somehow her fault. "We destroyed the _Von Braun_'s engines so that Hell couldn't go anywhere. But your ship can still fly! That's why they want it."

"Tholiar won't give it to them."

"I hope she can stop them, Will, I really do. Alex seemed to think it was possible, but…" She shook her head. She didn't want to say anything that would further upset Drake; she could see that he was taking the attack on his ship hard.

There came from behind them a sound that Annabelle hadn't heard aboard the _Von Braun_ for a very long time: laughter. It was warm and rich and genuinely amused, but there was something just a little dangerous beneath its surface. "Heh heh. You should have a little more faith, Annabelle. You don't know what our crew can do. Does she, Will?"

"Alex!" Exclaimed the captain joyfully.

She was approaching them from the far end of the corridor, carrying her particle cannon in her thin hands, her phase pistols holstered. Her odd clothes were smeared with dirt and there was blood on them; most of it was the reddish-black that the monsters bled, but some looked a lot more human. She had a cut on her right cheek, crusted blood covering it, and her vest had been torn at the waist; she had a bloody bandage wrapped around her stomach.

She had been through Hell, but she was still smiling.

Drake rushed over to her and impulsively embraced her. The young woman chuckled a little and returned the hug, briefly, before pushing him gently away. She wagged a finger and kidded, "Annabelle will get jealous."

Annabelle ignored the comment. "What happened to you? I looked…I couldn't find you anywhere."

Alex shrugged. "I obviously ended up somewhere else to you. The anomaly is a sentient, malicious force. It's been intentionally trying to keep us apart to prey on us."

"I met someone who said something similar."

"Really?" Alex's red eyebrows hitched up, intrigued. "Who?"

"A _Von Braun_ survivor. Corvin, I think he said his name was."

"Corvis, perhaps?" She suggested instead.

"Corvis?" Annabelle was appalled. "That bastard! He did all of this! He's still alive? I hoped the monsters had killed him by now."

"Heh heh heh. Oh, they won't kill him. He's far too important to them, you see. Do you see? No, you don't." She sighed. "Explanations. They're always a bugger. I'm much better at hiding things than explaining them. So much more practice. I'll give it a go, though."

"Alex…slow down. You're rambling."

She grinned. There was something dancing in her red eyes. Something…oddly playful. "Corvis is the key to all this. He was the first person to enter the anomaly. Like I said, it's a living thing. It infused him, messed about with his little brain, made him a part of it. He's a physical extension of the anomaly. It's host, sort of it. He controls the thingies running around this ship."

"That's crazy, Alex."

She nodded. "Insane, stupid, impossible. True, though. He's the controlling force. And you know it, Will. You met him. I can see it in your eyes. You're thinking back to that meeting. How odd was he? Confident and intense, despite everything that's happening."

Corvis wasn't the only one acting that way, Drake reflected. He had known Alex Nain for a long time; he had seen her in a variety of moods and in all sorts of situations. She was no stranger to this sort of terrible danger. He remembered standing with her as she faced down a small force of armed Sa'keth, opportunistic scavengers who had used the Romulan War as an excuse to steal territories from Earth and her allies. He recalled the way she had looked at their knives and fierce faces almost pityingly, and how, although he and she had been unarmed, she had been in absolute control of the situation. He had seen icy evil flare in her eyes and seen her murder dispassionately. He had seen her eyes narrow and blaze with fire, her whole personality filling with so much roaring anger that her very voice burned. But he had never seen her like this before. All of this was a game to her. A joke.

He wondered if this place was doing something to his friend.

No, he thought. Can't be. I'm fine, and so is Annabelle. Alex is just strange – she always has been. This is just her way of dealing with all this.

"If we find Corvis we end this," said Alex firmly.

"How do we do that?" Demanded Annabelle. "If you're right, and he's the devil in this Hell, he's not going to let us get anywhere near him, is he?"

A scratching, scurrying sound came from the opposite end of the corridor. The three Starfleet officers turned sharply, in time to see something emerging from the darkness. It slithered along the ground like a snake, but it had a shark-like head full of teeth, and long, thin tentacles reached from its body, probing at the corridor and the air around it. The three humans backed up slowly, Alex bringing her particle cannon to bear. She suddenly stopped and sniffed the air. Frowned. "Can anyone else smell gasoline?"

The monster screeched and belched a streamer of fire at them. Drake grabbed Alex's waist and threw them both to the floor as the burning ray of white flame shot at where they had been standing.

Alex laughed hysterically as she rolled out of Drake's grip. She fired the particle cannon from where she lay, the cone of energy vaporising the monster's head. The shot ignited the fuel the creature carried inside itself in a gland, and an eye blink later the whole monster exploded in a ball of orange flame and thick black smoke. Alex had guessed what would happen when she fired the gun, and she was already on her feet, grabbing Drake and Annabelle by their jackets and hauling them along with her. Flames licked up the corridor after them and Alex pulled her friends close to her, then threw herself through a door that was labelled 'antimatter fuel cells' but actually lead to an empty crew cabin. The three of them crashed to the floor, Alex rolling with the impact and coming nimbly back to her feet, the other two lying sprawled.

"That was new," she chuckled. "Fire-breathing snake monster. Don't see that every day. You two all right?"

"We're alive," Annabelle scolded, pushing herself onto her hands and knees. Drake helped her the rest of the way up while Alex looked on with cheeky cheerfulness loitering in her gaze. "Brilliant. Let's go and kill Corvis now, shall we?"

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"We're getting reports from the security teams on deck five. They've found some of the medical teams. Apparently, the medics say that they were attacked by…"

"By what, Mr Tucker?"

"Monsters, sir," he said uncomfortably. "Demons, snake-creatures, spider monsters, floating heads, all sorts of really weird things, sir."

Tholiar considered the report carefully. It sounded preposterous to her, but no one would make up something like that in their current situation. She had to believe that it was true, however unlikely that seemed to her. "Additional security forces to that deck. Seal off all passages off deck five and post teams at every access point. If they see anything other than one of our crew, they are to kill it."

"Aye, Commander."

She sat in the centre chair, but she was itching to be down on deck five, helping Inogashira and the security teams. The prospect of having a live rifle in her hands again, an enemy to shoot at, blood to spill…she had to work to keep such temptations out of her head.

At least repairs were proceeding smoothly, she told herself. Primary power had been restored to the bridge, and engineering assured them that the secondary computer core would be operational again within the hour. That was good news. And she trusted Inogashira to contain the situation on deck five.

Something else flashed on Tucker's panel – she saw it before he did. More bad news? She dreaded the thought.

The communications officer pressed a pair of buttons and a new graphic appeared on his screen. "Commander, we're receiving a hail from the _Von Braun_."

Her eyes widened. "What? How?"

"It's being routed through one of their subspace telescopes," said Green. "Clever. The telescope is a more powerful array than the standard comm dishes."

"And someone reconfigured it to transmit to us. Let us hear it, Mr Tucker."

The comm link fizzed and crackled with interference, but the voice was unmistakable and its message clear. "This is Lieutenant Nain to the _Endeavour_. I hope someone's hearing this. Things are a bit FUBAR over here. The ship has been overrun by nightmarish entities – monsters. The team's been scattered, and the anomaly is constantly reconfiguring the ship, making it impossible for me to tell where I'm going. I haven't had any contact with the rest of the team since we got aboard. I hope they're all right. Under no circumstances should you attempt to send in further rescue parties, and any ship that approaches without first confirming beyond any doubt that it's piloted by one of us should be fired on. We can't let this thing spread. I'm recording this message as I speak it. The computer's set to rebroadcast it every five minutes. Hopefully you won't have to listen to it too many times before I have something new to report."

"That's it, sir."

At least one of them was still alive, thought Tholiar happily. She had been losing hope.

"Can we send a reply?"

Green was the one who answered. While the helmsman had been speaking he had been making further scans of the rigged-up transmitter. "No. The telescope can't receive our messages. Frankly, I'm amazed Nain figured out how to use it as a transmitter."

The science officer had a low opinion of everyone's intelligence, but in this instance Tholiar was inclined to agree with him. Alex Nain was a good pilot, but the Andorian seriously doubted that she had a brain in her head.

"Monitor that frequency for further transmissions, Mr Tucker. And raise Starfleet Command. I want to talk to Admiral Archer. Mr Green, start working on a way to reconfigure our sensors to penetrate the anomaly's interference. I want to know if Ms Nain is the only survivor aboard that ship or not."

"Can't be done," he said stubbornly, sitting back in his chair with his arms folded, not even willing to make an attempt.

"Mr Green," said Tholiar tiredly, "if Ms Nain can turn a telescope into a transmitter I am quite sure you can boost the resolution of our scanners just a little."

Properly affronted, he set to work.

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"You must think yourself quite clever."

"Clever?" Retorted Alex. "I'm a bloody genius. And you're a satanic madman. Crovis, isn't it?"

"Clever," said the voice over the comm. "Clever, clever, clever. Won't do you any good, of course. Your warning came a little bit too late."

"What do you mean?"

"The _Endeavour_ has already been boarded. My children are spreading through her even as we speak. Soon that ship will be ours and we will use it to spread throughout the stars."

"You're a real screw job, you know that right? I mean, seriously, your brain's turned to pulp or something. Your little monsters won't take the _Endeavour_. They're too easy to kill." As if to demonstrate, she used her particle cannon to obliterate the spider-like creature, roughly the size of a dog, that had been creeping along the ceiling, getting ready to pounce on her. "See? Miho will wipe them all out."

"My children are without limit."

"Over here, maybe. See, I've worked that bit out, too. It's the anomaly that spawns these horrible things. But, and here's the funny bit, that little magic trick only works in here, inside this tormented space."

"Is that really what you believe?"

She laughed at his feeble attempt at a bluff. "If it wasn't you wouldn't need the _Endeavour_, would you? Or any ship at all. You'd just pop your 'children' into existence all across the Federation, and that would be that. But you said it yourself; you need the ship to spread. And since you used the shuttles to board her – I saw that, by the way – they're safely outside of your spawning range."

"For now." He sounded irritated. Good. That's what she had been going for. "That ship doesn't have to move far to be in range, though."

"Trust me, it's not going anywhere."

"You're a very irritating person."

"So I'm told. Since we're having this lovely little chat, Corvis, maybe you can answer a question or two for me. Like why are you doing this? And why did you go into the anomaly in the first place? That seems…a little rash to me."

He laughed. "Rash? Oh Nain. You're not as clever as you think you are. I knew what this was all along. I knew what it could do. I _wanted_ it. Why else do you think I came here? Why do you think I brought the _Von Braun_ here?"

A smugly superior grin popped onto her face. "Oh Corvis, I really am as clever as I think I am. I had been thinking about that. _Von Braun_'s a science ship, and they don't usually stray far from the explored and charted territories. We're out in the unknown here. I had been wondering. Thanks for clearing that up. So you'd been planning this insane little venture for a while?"

"Ever since I found out about this place, Nain. Ever since he told me."

"Who's that?"

"The King of Bad Dreams, of course," Corvis said, and he laughed, the sound echoing around the corridor. Alex was quite glad when he finally turned off the comm and she didn't have to listen to him any more.

"_He's definitely insane,"_ she remarked.

"_Unquestionably."_

"_That king he mentioned? Do you think _that's_ the dark presence that's been troubling you?"_

Kana shrugged. _"Without knowing who or what the king is, it's impossible to say. But it's a good theory."_

Alex kept walking. They had left the stellar cartography lab shortly after she had sent her message to the _Endeavour_. She hoped that the starship had received it. Judging from what Corvis had said to her, she imagined that they had, but it was possible that he had been trying to trick her for whatever reason.

That brief conversation had consolidated her resolve to find and kill Corvis as soon as she could.

He wasn't in any hurry to let her reach him. Every door she had gone through had taken her anywhere but where she wanted to be. She had been to the ship's hydrogen fuel storage pods, the main computer core, the mess hall, three crew cabins, six turbolift cars, the hydroponics garden, the arboretum, and five science labs, and in each place she had been forced to fight for her life. She was sore, tired, and bloody now. Her particle cannon and both phase pistols were severely depleted. She had armed herself with knives when she had found herself in the mess hall, glad that Kana had taught her how to throw and wield bladed weapons. She had to conserve as much of her remaining ammunition as possible.

She came across a door labelled as a medical storage room. Not expecting very much, she forced it open and went inside, stunned to find that she did actually end up in a medical storage room. She scrounged through the medpacks scattered around the floor until she found a stimulant, which she injected straight away, without first checking whether it was for humans, Vulcans, Andorians, or laboratory mice. She trusted that if she had accidentally just shot herself full of something dangerous, Kana would transform it into something beneficial.

Her strength returned, slowly. Alex knew that it wouldn't last. Only a good long rest and something nourishing to eat would do that, and neither was an option at the moment. The meds would have to do.

She wasn't the first to raid this room, she noticed. And then looking again she decided that she might not even be the first _human_ to raid the room. It looked like this place had been smashed up. There was blood on the floor and walls, supply boxes had been knocked over, and at her feet there was a hyperspanner that was sticky with black monster blood. She explored the small room, finding a human and a monster corpse. The monster was one that she had seen before, a bull with crab pincers attached; the human was a _Von Braun_ crewman, male, a hole in his chest. Oddly, it looked more like he had been shot than killed by the bull-thing.

"_What do you make of this, Kana?"_

"_I don't know. But you should look at this."_

Alex came over to where her friend was standing. _"What is it?"_

Kana pointed at the bulkhead and replied, _"More names."_

"_Pratchett, Chattaway, S'jek, and what's this? V.B. x2?"_

The words were burnt into the bulkhead in crisp, clear block capitals. Alex ran her finger over the scratches, feeling the rough edges where the molten plastic had accumulated. A phase pistol had done this, she was sure of that. It wasn't the first time that she and Kana had found names shot into walls aboard this ship. _"That brings the total to what? Twelve?"_

"_Yes. That we know of."_

"Twelve SSAR persons," Alex mused aloud. "And then this two times V.B. You think that could be _Von Braun_?"

"_A sensible guess."_

"_Someone's got a list. And they're crossing names off it."_

Kana nodded. _"It seems so. The question is where are the bodies?"_

Alex hadn't thought of that. _"Good point. There's one back there, but where are the other five? And all those other names we've seen. You don't think they've been…eaten, or something?"_

"_No, Alex. That would be stupid. We would still have found bones."_

"_Oh yeah."_ She was thinking about something else. Names. A list of victims. She knew all of them, in one way or another, but none had been particularly close to her. _But_ she had only seen a very small part of the ship. What if…somewhere else…there was Will's name on a wall? Or Sarn's?

She punched the bulkhead. The pain in her hand gave her something else to think about.

"_This isn't the time to be injuring yourself."_

"_Shut up, Kana!"_

The other her looked very deeply hurt, before she could get her angry mask back in place. Alex sighed deeply and apologised, _"Sorry, Kana. I'm just worried about our friends."_

"_So am I. But beating yourself up won't help. We have to find Corvin and kill him, remember? That will sort all this mess out."_

"_Right."_ She nodded. _"Right. Let's get back to it, then. Have you got all you need?"_

Kana nodded. _"We've been through the dimensional shifts enough times now. I've worked out how they work. We can control our destination now."_

"_Fantastic. We'll check the bridge and the engine room first. If he's not in those places we'll swing by the armoury to restock and then keep searching."_

She stepped out of the storage room and felt the dimensional rift greet her. She and Kana had been studying it since they had left the stellar cartography lab, working out how Corvis was able to send people across his ship at will. Now they understood, and now they could control the rift as well as he. She felt it tugging her in one direction and knew it wasn't the way she wanted to go. No, she silently told it, projecting all of her will behind that word, and the destination that she had in mind.

She opened her eyes.

She was standing on the bridge.

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At least, it had once been the bridge. Before the _Von Braun_ had entered the anomaly, this place had been its high-tech control centre. Now it resembled something more like a medieval torture chamber. There was blood on all of the walls, fleshy growths everywhere; chains and barbs dangled from the ceiling, fires flickered in bits around the edges of the bridge. The ship's captain dangled in the middle of the room from a hook through his throat; the other bridge officers were dead and mutilated as well. Alex was standing in the remains of the first officer. Skull and bits of brain were sticking to her boots.

There was something with her on the bridge, another creature. What it was she never saw. The particle cannon vaporised both it and the helm desk, then shut down. Its power cell was utterly depleted. She threw the weapon away and swore, feeling frustrated and useless.

The bridge was a charnel house, the crew slaughtered like animals. Alex thought she knew why. Annabelle had told her that Corvis had never got along with the Starfleet officers in command of the ship; there had been constant arguments.

Looked like he had had is revenge.

The comm snapped on again. "Very clever, Nain. But it's pointless. You won't find me."

"Don't count on it, you bastard!" She shouted back.

Corvis chuckled. "Such passion! Maybe you're right. Maybe you will find me. Maybe you'll kill me. But it's too late now."

"What does that mean?"

"Such an interesting nightmare you have." She could hear him smirking. "Such an interesting fear."

Alex felt her blood freeze. "Oh shit."

"_What?"_ Asked Kana. _"What is it?"_

"We have to find our friends."

"Too late. She's already with them."

Alex's voice when it came was very cold, inhuman. "I'll kill you for this."

"I imagine so."


	11. Chapter 11

_**Chapter Eleven**_

Sarn stared at her hands.

The blood fever was cooled, for now; her rational self was back in control. The murder had accomplished all of that. It had violently released the fury building up in her, the rage of _pon farr_. She was almost her old self.

But it wouldn't last, she knew that. Already she could feel the passion building in her again, the burning hot redness seeping into her thoughts. She would lose herself to it again, and the only way to regain control would be to kill again. Kill or mate. The only ways to satisfy the _pon farr_.

She kept her back to the corpse. She couldn't look at it without pain and hurt and despair flooding her, and to acknowledge any emotion in her condition, however slightly, would be disastrous.

She focused on her training, repeated the Vulcan mantras that had been drilled into her since childhood. She pictured the IDIC in her mind. It helped, a little.

For now.

No amount of meditation could suppress the _pon farr_, she knew that. No Vulcan master had ever successfully controlled the urge, and she was as far from a master as could be.

Mate or murder, it was the only solution.

She had already killed once, and she vowed that she would not do so again. Not unless it was one of those creatures.

Next time the urge took her she would find a mate, whatever it took.

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"Catch!"

William Drake grabbed the particle cannon from the air and turned it on the demon. This latest monstrosity was the worst that they had seen so far, and definite proof that at least one of the rescue party was a practicing Christian who really believed in the Bible.

It was a literal demon.

It stood twelve feet tall, had the legs of a goat, the upper body was muscular and black as space, and the head was a skull with flames for eyes and long horns protruding from its top. Air around the creature rippled from the heat it generated. It had already demonstrated the dangerous ability to hurl fireballs at them, although fortunately its aim was rubbish.

They were back in the shuttle bay. Since Drake had been there last, all of the shuttles had launched, creating a nice wide-open space for them to fight the demon.

Annabelle was sheltering behind a thick metal brace that stretched up the right hand wall of the shuttle bay. Such struts were placed regularly along both sides of the bay, reinforcing the ceiling. It was strongly reinforced and had already shown itself capable of surviving a hit from one of the demon's fireballs. Annabelle popped out from behind it every now and then to fire a couple of shots at the demon, but her phase rifle seemed ineffective at best.

The captain hoped that the particle cannon would do a better job.

Of course, he mused as he brought the weapon to bear, if that's literally the devil, this thing won't even scratch it.

He fired the cannon. The cone of bright white energy enveloped the demon and Drake heard the beast wail as the energy tore at it, vaporising the outer layers of skin and muscle. But the monster itself refused to turn into dust as all the others had. It seemed virtually unharmed by the cannon shot, and when the gun cut out to recharge its firing coils the demon retaliated by throwing a large glob of greenish fire at the captain.

He threw himself out of the way of the blast, skidding across the very smooth deck on his belly for several metres. There was a large explosion behind him as the blob of green plasma struck the deck and detonated, its concussive force driving Drake further across the bay. He pulled himself back to his feet, aching all over, and shot the demon again, while Annabelle added in a volley from her phase rifle. The monster screeched painfully a second time, but again they seemed unable to hurt it.

Drake swore that he would give whoever's mind this thing had sprung from a damned good kick when he found them, and fired again.

Where was Alex? He suddenly wondered, as he ducked a plasma ball. He hadn't seen his young friend since she had tossed him the particle cannon. She certainly hadn't been shooting at the demon. What had happened to her?

The next thing he knew, the shuttle bay doors were opening. The two massive panels slid smoothly apart to reveal the eternal coldness of space beyond, the merciless void held at bay only thanks to the atmospheric force field filling the opening.

A force field that winked out an instant later.

Drake felt the hurricane threatening to tear him from his feet as all the atmosphere in the shuttle bay rushed excitedly into space, taking with it all of the heat. He was dragged along the deck, his fingers and feet scrabbling desperately for purchase, until by luck he fell against a control station and was able to wrap himself around it. Annabelle was pressing her back against the support brace, it acting as a windbreak for her and keeping her safe.

The demon had no such luck. It lost its footing, fell, and was quickly sucked out into space. As it floated away, Drake saw it fling off a couple of glowing green orbs, before it finally became inert. Whether it was dead or not was debatable, if academic; deep space had frozen it solid.

So that was what Alex had been up to, he realised. While they had fought the monster, she had snuck up to the shuttle bay control centre, opened the outer door and dropped the force field. Clever.

Now, if she would just reverse the process and repressurise the bay…

He waited. He clutched onto the control panel, ignored the perfect cold that nipped at him, and he waited. But Alex seemed to be in no hurry to repressurise the shuttle bay. She had to be able to see that the demon was gone! Why wasn't she restoring life support?

Why hadn't she warned him what she was planning in the first place?

He thought of that mad spark he had seen in Alex's eyes recently. He worried again that his friend might have been affected by the anomaly.

He had to do something, or he was going to die. That was more important than anything else right now.

There was no longer a wind racing around; most of the atmosphere had been sucked into space already. He stood and tried to breathe, which was a mistake.

He was feeling groggy and lightheaded, and very, very cold. He knew what was happening to him. His body was shutting down, starved of oxygen and giving in to the freezing conditions. He had perhaps a handful of seconds before he was unconscious and after that only a few more before he expired.

That was enough time.

He moved around to the front of the console and tried to study its controls, but his eyes were blurring. His vision had already lost all colour, the console was just a grey blur. He searched his memory desperately. Starfleet built all of its panels to the same blueprints; the consoles on this ship were identical to the ones on the _Endeavour_. How was that one laid out? Where was the bay door override?

There!

He jabbed the button and slumped down the console again, his strength depleted. He hoped that he had pushed the right one. If he hadn't, he and Annabelle were definitely dead. But he thought…he thought…yes, he could feel air breathing against his skin, and sucked in a desperate lungful. It eased the fire in his chest. He felt comfortable. He felt exhausted. Sleep. He needed sleep. His useless eyes fluttered closed.

As he faded away into the darkness of unconsciousness he had one last thought. Why could he hear footsteps?

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"Chief Inogashira reports that the last of the creatures have been eliminated, Commander," said Tucker, an announcement that was met with whoops of delight from the bridge crew.

Tholiar didn't join in, but she indulged herself in a smile and said heartfelt, "My compliments to the chief. Mr Green, any success with those sensors?"

"I've managed to improve the resolution three hundred percent. It took some doing."

"Can you distinguish our party's life signs?"

"I can. That's what a three hundred percent boost to sensor resolution can do for you, Commander."

She felt her good mood evaporate quickly. "What is the status of our team?"

"I can account for all but five of them. I'm also registering an awful lot of those…things."

"How many is 'an awful lot'?"

"Can't say for certain, those numbers are still in flux. I guess those things are getting created and destroyed all the time."

"But most of our people are still all right?"

"Yes, sir. In fact, most of them are congregating in the ship's secondary cargo bay. There aren't any monsters in that region. It should be quite safe."

She hoped that he was right. "Mr Tucker, any new signal from the _Von Braun_?"

"No, sir. Lieutenant Nain's transmission keeps repeating at five-minute intervals. No change."

She didn't know what to do. She knew that their people were all right, but how much longer they would stay that way was debatable. She had to rescue them, somehow. But she couldn't bring the _Endeavour_ into transporter range without going inside the anomaly, and that seemed to be just inviting trouble to her. And any shuttle she sent in was just as likely to come back with a crew of monsters as it was with their people.

Think, think.

If only she could contact the away team, they could organise an extraction from both ends.

"Mr Green, collaborate with Mr Fran. You found a way to improve our sensors, see if you can do the same for the comm system. I want to be able to talk with our people."

"I'll give it a go," he said grudgingly. "But before I do there's something you should see."

"What is it?"

"My improvements to the sensors mean we can distinguish individual bio-signs." He put his display up on the main screen and indicated different coloured dots as he talked. "Look. Here's Captain Drake, that's a Vulcan signature so it must be Sarn, and here is Lieutenant Nain. And here's Lieutenant Nain," he said again, pointing to a different blob.

Tholiar didn't understand what he was getting at. "A sensor malfunction?"

"Checked and double-checked; everything's working fine. But I'm reading two Alexandra Nains over there."

Commander Tholiar had no idea what to say to that.

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"Wakey, wakey. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha."

Drake's eyes were heavy and sore but he forced them open at the sound of that voice. His vision swam for a moment, and his memory with it. Where was he? What had been going on? He felt like he had just spent a month in a meat freezer, his extremities were numb.

Strong, thin fingers forced his lips open and he felt cool water being poured down his throat. He guzzled it greedily, feeling parched. It was as though all of the liquid had been sucked out of his body, he was as dry as a bone. He gulped down the cool water in big mouthfuls, feeling it revitalise him.

Then the water was taken away and he heard a voice admonish, "That's enough. You don't want to drown yourself."

That voice…if he had been asked to define pleasant that voice would have been the description he gave. He could have listened to it forever. He trusted it implicitly. He knew the owner of that voice would never harm him, or let harm come to him if she could prevent it.

Yet…she had.

The fog disappeared from his mind, reality snapped into place. He was strapped to a bulkhead in what appeared to be the ship's cargo bay. Annabelle was tied up to his right, unconscious. Other people, SSAR and Von Brauns, were also held captive here. He saw that most of them had been gagged, presumably so that their jailor didn't have to listen to them screaming and shouting at her.

Their captor was the last person whom Drake would ever have expected to turn on him. If asked to place his life in anyone's hands he would have always chosen her in a heartbeat.

But she had betrayed him.

Attacked him.

Nearly killed him and the woman he loved.

He glared at her with hatred in his sea green eyes. "Alex?"

"Hello, Will. I thought you were going to sleep all day." She grinned at him, that crazy grin that she had been wearing since they had met. Her eyes danced with glee. He kept looking for madness in them, insanity, something to excuse her current behaviour, but there wasn't anything. She was lucid. And behind that twisted joy was something cold and calculating and brilliant.

She hadn't lost her mind, but he couldn't…he just couldn't picture the Alex he knew behaving like this. It wasn't like her. This Alex was like something out of a…nightmare.

He remembered the dream he had had, not so long ago, before they had been sent to find the _Daedalus_: A malicious Alex terrorising his sleep. He remembered Corvis' words to him: "I wonder what it'll make for you. I wonder what you fear." He remembered that this anomaly could bring your nightmares to life.

He narrowed his eyes.

"You're not Alex."

The scared Alex shrugged. "Technically…no. I suppose not. Believe me; I've been thinking about that one an awful lot, Will. Who am I? Really, who am I? I can't be Alex, can I, because she's alive and well and walking around this ship somewhere. Probably causing all kinds of hell for Hell." She laughed, a bellowing throaty laugh of darkest amusement, but turned very serious just a moment later. "But if I'm not Alex, who am I? I've got her body; I've got her memories, her thoughts and feelings. Believe me; I'm not happy about having to do this to you guys. Ha, ha. You probably don't believe me, but it's true anyway."

She was right, he didn't believe her. "If you don't want to why are you?"

"Because Hell made me, Will, and it wants me to. It wants her tortured. She fears for the safety of her friends. Ha, ha; trust me; I know that for a fact. Alex would do anything for any of you. She'd slaughter thousands to save your lives. So, I've been picking you off one by one. Leaving behind little notes to let her know. Names crossed off a list. She'll get the idea."

Her story rang false with him. Most of it was undoubtedly true, but there was one important element that was a total lie and he knew what it was. "The Alex I know would never let someone or something else dictate her actions."

"Ha, ha, ha! Very good!" She clapped her hands approvingly. "You're right, of course. All of this fits into my plan just as neatly as it does Hell's. You see," she dropped her voice to a whisper, "this place created me, and I'm grateful for that. Who isn't glad to be alive? Very sad people, that's who. But it thinks it can control me, and I don't like that at all."

Her eyes were scheming. Drake wished that he knew what she was thinking, but although he knew Alex as well as anyone alive he found her mind unreadable. All he could be sure of was that this Alex's plan somehow involved the other her – the _real_ her.

That made him instantly worried for his friend.

"What are you scheming?"

She smiled innocently and snickered. "Scheming? I'm not scheming anything. I'm offended you'd even think that."

"I know Alex Nain too well, and even though you're nothing but a cheap knock-off I can still read you."

She laughed. Loudly. She seemed to find that statement absolutely hilarious. "You know Alex? Poor foolish Will, you barely know her at all! H-ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! Most of what you think you know are lies and all the important stuff she's kept secret."

"What secrets?"

"Like I'm going to tell you! What would be the point, Will?" She grinned. "You know, I've enjoyed this chat. It's a shame it's going to have to come an end soon. And I really, really am sorry that I've had to chain you up like this. By the way, name's Phobos. Phobos Nain."

"Phobos?" He muttered.

"It means fear. Because that's what I am, aren't I? I'm her fear. Makes sense, huh?" She grinned and headed for the cargo bay's door.

"Where are you going?" Demanded Drake.

"I've still got some people to round up. Alex's would-be lesbian lover, for one. Oh, which reminds me. Talking of lovers."

She walked over to Annabelle.

Drake pulled at his bonds, not trusting Phobos anywhere near his girlfriend. "Don't touch her," he snarled.

Phobos ignored him utterly and pulled off Annabelle's gag. She poured a little water down the unconscious woman's throat.

The captain was stunned. "Why?"

"I thought you might want to talk."


	12. Phobos Nain

_**Phobos Nain**_

The moment that Alex Nain and her companions came aboard the _Von Braun_ it was already seeping into their minds, searching their thoughts and memories for the things they feared, the deep-rooted terrors that each person carried in their hearts. It found the predictable monsters and demons in most, but in Alex Nain it found something different. Something special. Something new and exciting for it.

Phobos Nain.

Alex's deepest, darkest fear. It wasn't of the dark, or monsters, or spiders, or snakes, or scorpions, or closed spaces, or wide spaces, or anything else that traditionally tormented the hearts and souls of men. Her fear was something else, something more personal.

It wasn't anything external that Alex feared. There was no reason for her to. She had travelled the length and breadth of the cosmos, she had seen evil in all of its forms and she fought it often. She had been in claustrophobic situations, she had been plunged into darkness, extremes of temperature, pressure, atmosphere, her body and mind had been abused all over the galaxy. She had faced it all and walked away from it all.

There was nothing left for her to fear.

Except for one thing. Something that she could never face out in the world, no matter how far she went.

Human weakness.

Her own weakness.

The spirit of Kana Nain resided within her, an alien entity of incredible power. Alex had seen with her own eyes what Kana could do with her exotic energies. She had travelled to the farthest corners of the cosmos under Kana's power, been brought back from the brink of death, and she had seen Kana lash out with her rage and strike down all those that opposed her.

So much power.

So close.

So tempting.

Her greatest fear was that she might one day give in to that temptation.


	13. Chapter 12

_**Chapter Twelve**_

"Scratch one off the list," muttered Phobos Nain, nudging House's corpse with the toe of her boot. She knelt down at the dead man's side and inspected his body carefully. He had taken a pounding: ribs cracked, nose and jaw broken along with one wrist, an eye had been gouged out, an ear ripped off, but none of these things had been the cause of death. The angry red marks around his throat and the swollen purple face told the whole story. He had been strangled.

Phobos stood up, tucking her hands into her trouser pockets and pondered. Someone had murdered Ensign House. Someone with human hands, judging by the marks on his neck. Who, though? One of the creatures? Some of them did have hands, although not the majority. There were zombies, both of the rotting carcasses spewed from someone's nightmare variety, and of the Von Brauns driven to absolute madness by the chaotic reality they found themselves in. Any of them could have throttled Mr House.

It still seemed unlikely to her. The anomaly – the King – savoured the terror of its prisoners. It didn't want to kill any of them. That cut the fun short. Every corpse was one less mind for the King to explore.

One of the survivors, then, driven mad with fear? It would have had to be one hell of a strong person to do all this to House, and that seriously narrowed down the list of suspects. Andorians were stronger than humans, as were Vobilites and Bolians, and there were several of each on the _Von Braun_. She had already captured most of them. There were two Andorians and an Aenar left at large on the ship, she remembered. One of them could have done this – although she sincerely doubted that Delith would have been responsible.

Killing wasn't his part to play.

Then she heard something in the room with her, something crawling along the deck plates, breathing deeply. It sounded in pain, or perhaps angry. She couldn't see it through the darkness, but her hearing was acute and she could tell where the creature was. It didn't sound to her like one of Corvis's 'children' as he so liked to call them.

I'm one of his children, she mused. I'm not a real person; I'm just the spawn of _her_ nightmares.

There would be a time and place to deal with that, and it wasn't here or now. She had already pictured the confrontation between herself and…and the original her. She had it all planned out, down to the last detail. She knew exactly what her original would do just as well as she knew her own part.

The shuffling again; it focused her thinking.

"Hello?" She called into the darkness. "Who's back there?"

It came to a sudden stop; the breathing became shallower, the entity trying to hide. Phobos took a step towards it, smiling peacefully. "It's okay. Heh, heh. I'm not going to hurt you."

There was the metallic taste of a lie on her tongue as she said that last part. She felt bad about lying, about attacking her friends, but it was necessary.

She cackled and cooed, "Come out, come out whoever you are."

She didn't honestly expect a reply and so was very deeply surprised when a voice hissed back, "Alex?"

"Sarn, my dear."

She had never heard the Vulcan woman sound so honestly, irrationally angry. Almost as though her blood was boiling inside her.

The Vulcan crept into the light. She was moving on all fours, like an animal, her eyes were wide and staring, seemingly solid black because of the massively expanded pupils. Sweat caked her olive skin, plastering her black hair to her scalp. She was boiling up, and had shed her uniform in an attempt to keep cool. The duplicate of Alex was briefly distracted by the sweat glistening off Sarn's luscious body. She had inherited her original's libido and sexuality along with everything else, it seemed. She licked her lips and then noticed that there was blood on the Vulcan's hands.

House's blood.

"What have you done, Sarn?"

"Stay away! Stay away! I can't help myself." There was spittle on her lips, madness in her eyes. She clenched her hands and pulled at her hair. "I've lost control. Stay back or I might _hurt_ you!"

Phobos knelt down, studying the raging Vulcan as she might a problem in a textbook. Amusement flickered in her red eyes, and understanding with it. "That's your fear, isn't it?" She snickered. "A loss of control. Breakdown of your Vulcan mind."

"_Pon farr_. I hate it. Hate it! _Hate it!_" She screamed.

Phobos understood. "The mating drive. Something so strong, so fundamental to your bodies that you can't suppress it no matter how hard you try. You have to free yourself of the lust and you can only do it by killing or mating."

"I know!"

She moved towards the Vulcan, still smiling. She locked her eyes onto Sarn's and wouldn't let herself look anywhere else, no matter how tempted she was. "You've tried killing, it didn't work. So that leaves only one option doesn't it?"

Sarn withdrew, frightened. She knew Alex more intimately than anyone on the ship and she knew that the young woman in front of her was not her shipmate. Suspicion and distrust joined the irrational anger in her expression. "Who are you?"

"I'm Nain."

"You're not Alex. I can sense it."

Phobos chuckled. "I didn't say I was Alex, did I? I said I was Nain. Phobos Nain."

"Fear? You're one of the monsters!"

"Ha, ha, ha, heh, heh. That's hardly fair. I'm trying to help you."

"How?"

She was grinning as she ran a hand down her chest. "I think I already covered that."

"I won't let you touch me!" Sneered Sarn, her eyes narrowing. She snapped and launched herself at Phobos, hands clenched into fists, striving to crush the foul clone's skull with her bare hands. It would bring her peace; bring her balance, she was sure of that. Destroy this wrong duplicate of her friend and she would be free of the _pon farr_ blood fever.

Phobos fell onto her back as the enraged Vulcan flew at her, kicking up as she did so. Her boots dug into Sarn's toned stomach and she rolled back, propelling Sarn over her head and into the wall. She bounced off and landed on her feet, hissing and snapping.

The duplicate Nain was already standing, watching her, grinning manically. "Feeling better? Is this helping?"

Sarn snarled and attacked again, her fist flying at Phobos' head. She deflected the blow with her right arm, grabbing onto Sarn's fist and pulling her forward, adding to the momentum of her swing. It pulled the Vulcan off balance and Phobos capitalised on it, launching a spinning kick that connected with the side of Sarn's head and knocked her down.

Sarn swept out with her legs, taking Phobos' feet out from under her. The human crashed down and Sarn leapt on top of her. The Vulcan sent a fist crashing into the side of Phobos' jaw, and her head snapped around hard. She felt her world spin, but the blow hadn't done her any serious harm. She drove a palm into Sarn's face and the Vulcan fell off her, spitting blood from a cracked lip. Phobos took the opportunity to get to her feet, and get some distance between herself and the science officer. She smirked at the wounded Vulcan.

"You should be winning this, you know," Phobos taunted. "You're faster, stronger. I'm only human. Well…sort of!" She cackled.

Her blood frothing, Sarn leapt at Phobos again. The human was ready for her and danced nimbly out of her path. She caught hold of Sarn's jacket and propelled her hard against the solid metal wall. Vulcan strength kept her from suffering any serious injuries, but Sarn was dazed. The duplicate of her friend took out her legs, sending her to the deck again.

Phobos pounced on the science officer, easily pinning her down. Sarn snapped, trying to bite her. Phobos retaliated by kissing her, starting with her lips and then moving slowly down, carefully exploring each inch of the science officer as she encountered it.

The Vulcan resisted at first, but only at first.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"We have to find them, we have to stop this madness, we have to –"

"_Alex! Slow down and start talking sense."_

She whirled around to stare at her other self, eyes full of fear. "We have to –"

"_I listened last time,"_ moaned Kana. _"And the three times before that. Amusing as your rants are, they don't tell me a lot. Now, what is going on?"_

"Look at all these names!" They were in the arboretum now. As soon as they had arrived Alex had begun searching for the wall with names phasered into it, knowing that she would inevitably find one. There had been one in almost all the rooms she had been to since the bridge, since she had worked out who was responsible for the names, and what they probably meant.

Kana scanned down the list: Cantrew, Braith, Barb. Three members of the SSAR team, she knew: a couple of security personnel and a nurse. Alex had played poker with them on the flight out. They had seemed like okay people.

"_What about them?"_

"Three names we recognise. And then look next to them. V.B. times five."

"_Five _Von Braun_ people."_

"Exactly."

Kana folded her arms and wondered if anything her host had just said should explain things for her? _"What's your point?"_

Alex was feeling snappish. "Pay attention, Kana! Look at it, it's perfectly obvious! Three names that we know, five that we don't."

"_Why don't you just tell me what you're thinking in simple English? How's that for an idea?"_

Alex looked at her irritably. "I can't believe you can't work this out. Those are our friends on the list. Our friends and some…strangers. And you heard what Corvis said to us in the bridge. He's made my fear real!"

"_Which rather brings us back to that question you wouldn't answer earlier. What is your fear, Alex?"_

The arboretum was built on two levels, an upper observation deck looking down on the main levels where the trees grew, and where Alex stood conversing with her second self. Someone leant against balcony's safety rail, watching. Although she couldn't see Kana Nain's spectral form, she could picture clearly how the creature would be standing, the expression on her face, the words she spoke.

"Let me guess: you still haven't told her?"

The two Nains turned and looked up at the balcony.

The third Nain waved down at them.

Kana was the first to get over her shock and she turned on Alex with fury and betrayal fighting for dominance in her expression. _"That's me! After all our years together, our friendship…_I'm_ the thing you fear?"_

Alex shook her head numbly. "That's not you."

"_Then…"_ Kana blinked, even more confused. _"Then it's…"_

"Me."

The third Nain clapped a slow, sarcastic round of applause.

Alex drew both phase pistols and shot at her, but the other Alex had known what she was going to do as soon as she did, and she ducked perfectly. She had her pistols in hand a moment later and shot back, but Alex had anticipated that and had put a large tree trunk between herself and her duplicate.

"Stalemate," cried the other Alex, absolutely delighted.

Alex ducked out and fired again. A deadly red beam of light blew apart a section of the railing next to where Phobos was standing, but the other her had moved again. She shot back, and although Alex was fast enough to avoid the energy beam she didn't avoid the spray of sap it produced when it blew a hole in the tree.

"We could keep this up all day."

"No we couldn't!" Barked Alex, stepping out and firing, this time aiming not for Phobos but for the supports that held up her platform. The energy beams cut swiftly through the metal and the gantry wobbled unstably, then came crashing down to earth.

From the safety of the doorway, Phobos shot back. Alex was barely fast enough to avoid the beam that had been intended for her heart. She felt it burn through the air right next to her and her heart skipped a beat. If she had been a split second slower the evil her would have nailed her.

"You're slow, Alex!" The copy mocked. "What's the matter? Worn out?"

"Get down here," Alex challenged from the safety of behind a tree, "and I'll show you how worn out I am!"

Phobos laughed maliciously. "I'd love to, but I've got no time. See you, for now."

"You're just running away?"

She hesitated at the threshold of the doorway. "You're low on my list of priorities right now. I've got others to round up."

"Leave my friends alone!"

"Heh heh. Like you could make me! But if you're interested you should try the shuttle bay."

Alex leapt out from behind her cover and took a parting shot at her copy, but it was already too late; Phobos had gone through the door. The energy beam did nothing but kill a lump of fleshy growth on the corridor outside the arboretum.

"Shit!" Screamed Alex.

"_Calm down."_

"No. No frigging way! I'm going to find her; I'm going to kill her, that little bitch!"

She strode for the door on her level, eyes full of the arctic coldness that was her anger, her evil. Nothing else mattered to her but finding that copy and killing her. And she knew where to start looking.

"_The other you won't be in the shuttle bay,"_ Kana warned, desperate to get Alex to listen to sense. _"You're too smart to give away your plans to your enemy like that."_

Alex ignored her and stepped through into the shuttle bay. There were three creatures waiting for her. They had been human once; _Von Braun_ crewmen, but now they were something else entirely. Mad eyes, completely black, snapped in her direction. The creatures hissed and raised their bloody hands. They ran at her, faster than anything so decrepit and wasted should be able to move, no thoughts in their heads but to batter her into a pulp and perhaps eat the remains.

She gunned them down dispassionately.

There was no sign of Phobos, no sign that she had ever been here. Alex swore. She should have known that the other her would lie, but she had assumed that the copy had been trying to lure her into a trap, somewhere where she could fight with all of the advantages. She hadn't expected to be just dismissed like this.

"_If you're ready to listen to me now…"_

"What is it?" She demanded coldly, in no mood to hear one of Kana's 'I told you so' speeches.

Her alien counterpart was gesturing at one of the bulkheads, upon which Alex could see there were scratch marks. _"Take a look, but brace yourself."_

She did exactly as she was told. Even before she saw them she knew which names to expect. One was missing, but the other two were carved crisply and clearly: WILL, ANNABELLE.

"That bitch."

Kana felt this was an appropriate time to ask, _"Who, exactly, is she?"_

"She's me. My worst fear."

"_Which is what?"_ When it didn't look like Alex was going to answer she pointed out, _"We're long past the point where keeping quiet about such things is beneficial. Or wise."_

"You're right," sighed Alex. "You know, I especially hoped that you would never have to know any of this. It's my shame as well as my fear, because it does have something to do with you. With the power that you have. I'm human, Kana, and I have human weaknesses. You've always been in me, the power of a god inside me. Do you know how tempting that is? Sometimes…I've wondered what I might be able to do if I could somehow…seize your power. Make it mine." She shook her head sadly and hoped that her friend could forgive her. "My greatest fear is that somehow I'll give in to that temptation. I'll kill you, rob you of your power, and use it to do terrible things."

Kana watched her silently.

"That's what she is. She's a me who's lost her moral core. She's a me that's stolen everything that's yours. She's got all of my brains, all of my training and cunning, and all your power."

"_And that makes her more dangerous than anything we've seen before,"_ finished Kana.

Alex nodded. "Yeah. These stupid little monsters that we've fought are nothing. They're brainless things with lots of muscle and claws and fireballs, whatever, but they're nothing. Shot them and they die. They don't have the brains to fight tactically, they're just beasts." She sighed. "But she…she's me. That means she's got at least one brain cell."

"_You're far more intelligent than you ever give yourself credit for,"_ said Kana. _"Unfortunately for us."_

"Yup. If only I was as stupid as everyone thought."

She faced her friend for the first time since she had admitted her phobia. She looked for the anger and disappointment and betrayal that she expected to see in Kana, but she found none of it there. Her friend seemed concerned, but otherwise her normal self. "I'm so sorry about this, Kana. It's all my fault."

"_I admit, I would rather you had been terrified of spiders or something. Your demon is a very personal one, Alex. I understand it and I don't blame you for it."_

"Really?"

Kana nodded. _"If this had happened to us even a decade ago, we would probably be facing a duplicate of me that had killed you and stolen your body. There was a time when that tempted me. It doesn't anymore. Just as I don't think you've considered stripping me of my power recently."_

"Not for years and years," Alex assured her. "But the fear didn't go away."

"_No. Some never do."_ She looked distant and sad then, caught up in her memory. Alex wondered what her other soul was thinking about.

And then a frightening thought occurred to her.

"Wait! If Corvis can read my mind and bring my fears to life, what's to stop him doing that to you?"

Kana had been thinking the exact same thing since they had worked out what was going on around the ship, and she had a theory. _"Maybe your mind being at the 'front' is creating a sort of buffer, keeping my mind out of his sight. Or maybe my mind is too alien for him to make sense of."_

"Maybe." Alex sounded unconvinced. "Are you sure he hasn't brought any of your phobias to life?"

"_Believe me, Alex, if one of my nightmares had become real we wouldn't be having this conversation."_

"We'd know?" Suggested Alex.

"_We, and probably everyone else in the universe, would be dead."_

"Ah."

Kana nodded. _"I have some very dark dreams. Now, let's find and stop the other you."_

_-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Tholiar paced the bridge. She had finally received a reply from Admiral Archer on Earth. A Starfleet carrier group had been dispatched to their coordinates, but she couldn't expect their arrival in less than week. Until such time, her direct orders were to maintain position and ensure that no one entered or left the anomaly.

Orders that she would have felt more comfortable carrying out if her captain hadn't been over there.

To make matters worse, they had lost all contact with the research vessel again. The repeating signal that had been being beamed to them through the subspace telescope had abruptly ceased mid-transmission a few minutes ago. She had briefly hoped that that meant Alex was recording a new message to send, but so far there had been nothing.

"Commander! Something's happening aboard the _Von Braun._"

"Can you be more specific, Mr Green?"

He sighed tiredly. "Yes, I can. The ship's beginning to generate a subspace field."

"A what?"

"A subspace field. Like a warp field, you know?"

Tholiar knew exactly what he meant.

The _Von Braun_ was getting ready to leave the anomaly.

Hell was getting ready to spread.


	14. Chapter 13

_**Chapter Thirteen**_

The King of Bad Dreams was pleased, Corvis could feel it. So many delicious new nightmares aboard the ship now, and the prospect of reaching so many more was finally becoming a reality. He could feel the deck plates throbbing again as the restored warp core beat with power. Chief Maki had done a good job of sabotaging it, but his children had been up to the task of repairing the damage. The ruined dilithium articulation frame had been scrapped and replaced, the plasma conduits patched, the EPS relays rerouted. The ship was coming alive again!

Soon it would leave this place and travel amongst the stars once more. That was an achievement in itself, but he had managed so much more. He had been thinking, why go out and capture people to bring to the anomaly when he could bring the anomaly to them? Expand it, drag it behind the ship, and he could bring Hell to every world in the Federation.

So many nightmares for the King to enjoy.

So many monsters to swell his army.

He sat comfortably in the small office that had once belonged to Chief Maki and waited while his children completed the last of the repair work, and the modifications to the deflector dish that would let them take the anomaly in tow. He was proud of them, every one of them. Such beautiful creations, everything that the King had promised him, more than a year ago, when he had met that all-powerful man on Keskus, during the _Excelsior_'s survey of that world. A year of waiting and planning, carefully manipulating the course of the _Von Braun_ to bring it to the dimensional tear.

It had been worth the wait! Worth all of the idiocy he had had to put up with from Holler and his Starfleet fools, from the scientists, from Starfleet Command. All of it was trifling next to what he had earned for himself.

Everything had worked as planned. The _Von Braun_ had entered the distortion, the chaotic energy had infused him and he had become part of the anomaly. He had learnt so much from it. It wasn't a creation of the King's, as he had first thought. The anomaly had been born long before, a scar in reality that was a wound from the ancient war. In one of the final battles between the Enemy and the forces of the Milky Way a fleet had been destroyed in this place, above a weak point in subspace, forging the rift.

So he had the general in charge of that battle to thank for his newfound power.

She was aboard the ship now, as he well knew. Hiding behind the mind of another – her precious host. He couldn't read her thoughts, but he knew that she was there; he had heard the counterparts talking to one another. From their conversation he knew one of her fears.

The King looked forward to indulging in her fear, and there his wishes and those of Corvis diverged. Fascinated as his scientist's nature was by the ancient spirit that dwelt inside her, Lieutenant Nain was just too dangerous.

His door opened and a small redhead stood in the doorway, grinning at him. He felt a brief surge of pure and utter panic at the sight of her, before he noticed the scar on her pretty face; the one that she had intentionally carved into her own flesh so that he could tell her from their common enemy.

"Phobos, my child," he greeted pleasantly. "How goes your hunt?"

"I've caught most of them." A contemptuous little chuckle chased her next words: "The Aenar's being tricky, but I'll nab him soon enough."

Of course she would. Corvis had no doubt of Phobos' fighting prowess or the strength of her mind. That was what made her so dangerous.

"Good, good, good. And your…progenitor?"

"Alex, you mean?" She enunciated the name clearly so that he might not forget it again. "We've exchanged shots. And insults. She's running around the ship somewhere now, gunning for me."

"Why isn't she dead?"

Phobos frowned. "Dead? I…you told me not to kill anyone. You wanted everyone alive so that you could keep using their phobias. Right? Isn't that what you said?"

He realised that he had spoken to her too sharply from the glinting ice he saw in her dark red eyes.

"It is. You've remembered well, my child." He rose and came over to her. Hugged her to him gently and stroked a hand through her spiky red hair. "Very well. But your…but Alex Nain is too dangerous to be let live."

"Why?"

"Because she's smart. So very, very, very smart. And if she's left alive she could find a way to stop us. And we don't want that, do we?"

"No." She had a very strange expression on her pretty face. Corvis couldn't read it.

"What's wrong, my dear?"

"It's just…" She swallowed. "What happens to me? If she dies, I mean. Because I'm, you know, a bit of her. If she dies…"

He understood and reassured, "Hush, my child. You're not a dream; you're not an echo or a reflection. You are you. You are real. You're flesh and blood and as real as anyone born of man and woman. You have your own life, now, and your own destiny. If she dies, she dies. It does affect you."

"Really? You're not just saying that?"

He smiled at her fondly. Stroked her cheek. Her skin was smooth and cool despite the warm, humid air aboard the ship. "Really. None of the things spawned here would disappear if their creators were killed. We just wouldn't be able to replace them."

Phobos' expression became very distasteful, hard and irked. "So that's what you would do if I got killed? Just make a replacement?"

He placated, "You could never be replaced, Phobos. But…yes…another would be spawned. It would be necessary, you understand. You're the only one I trust can take care of Nain."

"You're really afraid of her."

Did she sound pleased as she said that? No, no. Of course not! That was a ridiculous thought, and he didn't know why it had even crossed his mind. Phobos was a product of this place. She was loyal. She had to be.

"She's brilliant," he said honestly. "And brilliant people are the most dangerous. Take the warp drive, for instance. Do you know how we were able to get it back on line? Chief Maki blew out most of the warp coils to ensure that we wouldn't be able to make a stable subspace field. Do you know how we got around that?"

"You reconfigured the subspace telescopes to fill the gaps in the field?"

Corvis nodded. "Exactly. Exactly! It took me days to think of that. I might never have come up with it at all, if Nain hadn't used the 'scope as a transmitter. And see, it took me a long time to think of that and you came up with it on the spot just now, just like that," he snapped his fingers. "You have an amazing mind. So does she. And while you're using yours to help me, hers is devoted to destroying all of us. Do you see now? Do you see why she has to be stopped?"

Phobos nodded. "Yes. I understand. I understand perfectly."

"Good girl." He patted her on the shoulder. "Round up the others, kill Nain."

"Sure."

How I love her, Corvis thought as he returned to his desk. She was the smartest of all his children, smarter even than him. She had the most potential. The others, as much as he loved them, were just savage beasts, barely controllable. He had been reluctant to create Phobos at first, but now that he had he couldn't imagine doing any of this without her.

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"_Why are we back in stellar cartography?"_

Alex was fussing over a console, tapping on a keyboard with one hand while she pulled out and rearranged clumps of wires and circuits with another. "I've got to get another message to the _Endeavour_. I've got to tell them to destroy this ship. A few photonic torpedoes and this nightmare's over."

"_What makes you think your last message even got through?"_

"Because Tholiar didn't send in any more teams after those shuttles tried to board the ship. So she must have got my warning. The only thing is…" She swore and kicked the console in frustration. "I can't access the telescope. Something's locking me out of the system."

Kana wasn't listening to that part, busy thinking about something else. _"You know that if Tholiar destroys this ship, we'll die as well. I can't risk taking over, even to save us. If this place makes my nightmares real…"_

"Universal destruction, I know. And I know this means death for us. Are you all right with that?"

Kana thought about it. She had lived for longer than she had ever dreamed and in that time she had seen and done a great deal. There was still more to do, though. Worlds she had heard of but not seen, experiences she hadn't had. And she had been so enjoying this life she shared with Alex. More than anything she had ever done before.

She didn't want to die.

But she thought again of Alex's mortality. One hundred years, tops, and her host would perish naturally. She would be on her own again, if she didn't die with her.

She didn't want that, either. She didn't want a life without Alex.

And given the choice between that and death now…

"_Yeah. I'm fine with that."_

Alex's smile was full of love. "I knew you'd say that." She went back to working on the console. "The problem is I just can't get this stupid thing to work. Someone has completely changed the access codes to the telescope, and they've added a dozen layers of extra security protocols. I bet I know who did this, the little bitch. We might have to do it ourselves. Blow up the _Von Braun_ from the inside."

"_If we could get to the antimatter fuel pods…"_

"Good idea."

As they turned to leave they finally saw that they weren't alone in the lab. A thin figure of a man was standing by the doorway, dressed in the rags of a Starfleet uniform. His skin was white as snow, as was his hair. Antennae twitched on the top of his head, as though probing the air. He stared in the direction of the two Nains with sightless pink eyes.

"_An Aenar,"_ observed Kana.

"My name is Delith," he said, his voice whispery and very calm. "You are Alexandra Nain?"

"I am. How do you know that?"

"Forgive the intrusion. I have touched your mind without permission, I apologise. It is not something I usually do."

"It's strictly forbidden by your peoples' doctrine."

"Indeed so. But desperate times call for desperate measures, do they not?" He raised an eyebrow.

Alex smiled tightly. "You've been digging quite deep, I see."

"Yes. Your mind is full of knowledge and even more full of secrets. Secrets within secrets within secrets. You hide so much; I know I only found a tiny fraction of it all. A second soul, and so very much more besides. Your mind is an amazing place, Lieutenant."

"You know about my other soul?"

"Yes. And I know what you will do to me to keep that knowledge from being disseminated."

Just so long as he knew; but for a walking dead man he seemed pretty calm and collected. Which was doubly remarkable considering what was going on around here. Alex grew more suspicious. "Can you read her mind?"

"No. Yours provides a very effective barrier. And because you guard your thoughts so carefully I think I was lucky to discover her existence at all. But that doesn't matter. It isn't her that's important, it's you."

"Explain."

"I have been in other minds. Since the ship was attacked I have been hiding. Moving around the ship, trying to gain understanding of what is going on and why. I found Corvis. He's behind it all."

"I know that."

"He's afraid of you. Terribly, terribly afraid."

Alex blinked. That had been news to her. "Afraid of me? Why?"

"Because you're smarter than him. More determined, more…ruthless. He's convinced you'll stop him. Unless _she_ kills you first. That's why he made her. He was reluctant to. He thought she would be as dangerous to him as to you, but you drove him to it."

"How?"

"By slaughtering his monsters. Everything he threw at you, you brushed it aside. None of these demons he pulled from our phobias could challenge you. But your own fear…since she is you, she's your equal. She's the only thing with a chance of killing you. So, in desperation, he took her out of your head and made her real. He told her to defeat you. She targeted your friends first; knowing that isolating you would weaken you. She…I've seen into her mind, as I've seen yours." He looked at her pleadingly. "This is all a game to her!"

"I know."

"She knew I was watching her. She _let_ me. She let me learn so much, and then…I know she sent me to find you. I'm just a pawn to her. We all are. She's planning something. I don't know what, but –"

A phase beam struck Delith in the back. His body was haloed for an instant in pink light, and then his eyes rolled back and he slumped.

Phobos caught him, one phase pistol pressed against the Aenar's round skull, the other pointed at Alex.

"There you go," she said pleasantly. "Now you know."

As much as she wanted to take a shot at Phobos, she knew that she couldn't risk it. Her copy just needed to twitch and Delith's body would be in the path of the beam; and she would see the attack coming just as soon as Alex made up her mind to do it.

"If you've killed him…"

"Set to stun," she assured, jiggling the pistol in her left hand – the one against Delith's temple. But Alex could see that for herself now. The setting indicator light on the rear of the pistol was green. The one on the other gun was red, however. Lethal setting.

But why hadn't Phobos killed him, she asked herself? What did she get by keeping him alive? Except for an Aenar shield and a corpse would have been just as effective at absorbing phase energy. Her duplicate had to know that she would shoot through Delith, alive or not, if it meant stopping her. As the Aenar had said, she could be utterly ruthless, and to stop her evil copy she would be; she knew better than anyone just what Phobos was capable of.

But still the question of why she had left Delith alive nagged at her. In Phobos' place, she wouldn't have. She wouldn't have left any alive. She would have dotted the ship with corpses for her duplicate to find, to drive her into a fury of despair.

She hadn't. The only reason Phobos would leave anyone alive was if doing so fitted into her plan. But what plan? A lure? She hardly needed one – Alex would track Phobos to the ends of the universe, just because she existed. What then?

If she knew that, she realised, she would understand _exactly_ what Phobos was up to.

Stall for time, stall for time. Maybe squeeze some information, too.

"What do you want?"

Phobos grinned. "You dead."

She was lying. Alex could see it clear as day.

"Shoot me then."

"Oh no. That would be too quick, too easy. Come on, Alex, we've seen the same movies. The bad guy doesn't just shoot the hero. There has to be an elaborate death scene. A final battle where everything's at stake."

"The villain always dies in that scene."

"Yup. So he does."

She stepped out of the stellar cartography lab, drabbing Delith with her. Alex made no move to follow. Instead, she walked over to the console and sat down in its chair, thinking.

Phobos had just given her a message.

She just had to work out what it meant.

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"Sarn. Are you all right?"

The Vulcan had been tied up on the captain's left. Phobos hadn't said a word as she bound the woman and left her hanging. And since she had left, Sarn hadn't said or done anything. She just hung there, her head downcast, apparently oblivious to the world around her

What had happened to her out there, before Phobos had found her, to make the Vulcan so withdrawn? Or was it something that Phobos herself had done to make her like this?

"Sarn?"

She seemed to respond this time, if only to roll her head away from him.

"What's happened to her?" Asked Annabelle.

"I don't know. Sarn? Sarn, talk to me."

The Vulcan had heard every word her captain had said but she couldn't answer him. The anger and passion that had been clouding her mind was gone, but being free of the _pon farr_ lust brought her no peace. House's death lingered on her conscience. The blood had been cleaned from her hands but she could still feel it. She remembered attacking House, remembered his skin and bones breaking as she pummelled him, remembered her hands wrapping around his throat, crushing the air and the life from him.

But that wasn't the extent of her shame. What she had done to escape from the blood fever this place had brought on…she squeezed her eyes tight shut to try and shut out the image, but it only made it stronger.

"Everyone getting along?"

She shivered at the sound of that voice. That deceptive voice, so like the one she most wanted to hear, now more than ever.

But it wasn't her.

"What have you done?" Demanded Drake.

Phobos was running out of room on the cargo bay walls to hang all of her prisoners. The Aenar was the last of the _Von Braun_ survivors, the other forty-three already chained up alongside the SSAR people who had come to try and save them. She didn't consider the Aenar any sort of threat to her, so she just bound his arms and legs, gagged him, and dumped him at the feet of Doctor Pettigrew, the research vessel's former assistant chief medical officer.

"Taking care of business," replied Phobos, tightening the Aenar's bonds. "Delith here is one of the last."

"Last what?"

"Last crewmen wandering the ship. I think there are still a couple of your SSAR guys out there, but they don't matter to me. Everything's set up now."

Sarn didn't like the sound of that, and neither did the captain. He snapped, "What are you planning?"

"Oh relax, Will. You've played your part already. So has he. I let him wander around the ship and learn…well…everything I wanted him to, really. And he did just as I expected."

Annabelle groaned, "Will you spare us the how clever you are speech? Please?"

"He asked." She grinned maliciously. "And I am so very, very clever, Annabelle DeCroix. You've always looked down your nose at me, treated me like a fool, but I'm far smarter than you."

"You are an idiot," sneered Annabelle, not caring if her comment enraged Phobos or not.

The copy of Nain cackled. "Oh really? That's why –"

"No, no, no, don't waste your time trying to get them to understand, my dear. Their puny intellects will never comprehend."

"Corvis!" barked Annabelle. "I'll kill you for this."

The scientist was standing in the cargo bay's doorway, a pair of his bull-like monsters flanking the corridor. He smirked as he strode to the middle of the bay; his hands clasped casually behind his back, a man completely in control. He gestured and Phobos obediently came to his side, her head downcast and subservient. Drake had never ever seen Nain behave that way. The one he knew didn't let anyone control her, he knew that. She followed his orders because she wanted to, because doing so served her purposes. But this duplicate Nain seemed to be letting Corvis call the shots.

Corvis glanced at Annabelle and at last responded to her. "Yes, I imagine you would. If you could. But my dear child here has taken care of you, hasn't she?"

The young scientist turned her ire on Phobos. "You're working for him?"

"Seems so," replied the maliciously grinning copy.

"Why? Why are you helping him?"

"He helped me," she shrugged. "It only seems fair."

She's lying about something, Drake knew. She had glanced at him when she had spoken, her eyes twinkling with that familiar mischief. She had let him know that she was lying. Why? What part did that play in this convoluted game of hers?

Corvis stroked Phobos' hair, like a father nurturing a child. Drake couldn't believe that Nain would appreciate such attentions, but her eyes closed happily and she seemed to relax. "It's time to finish this, Phobos."

"Yeah," she sighed. "I guess so. I've been enjoying this game so much, though."

"There will be other games," he promised. "Imagine the fun when we take this ship and its contents and the anomaly into the heart of the Federation! Think of the games you could play then."

She perked up, grinning again. "Yeah. Right, like you said, let's end all this nonsense." She walked over to Drake and relieved him of his communicator. As she stepped away her eyes met his again and they seemed to be saying 'trust me'. For a moment there, he could have sworn that it was Alex, not Phobos, who was facing him.

The moment passed.

"I assume this will work?" She asked Corvis. He nodded and she snapped the communicator open, it emitting a little bleep as it activated. "Alex. Cargo bay two." She closed the communicator and tossed a look over her shoulder at Corvis. "You might want to duck."

The cargo bay door huffed open just a moment later and Alex strode in, a phase pistol in each hand and a look of arctic fury on her face. Her thin red eyes went immediately to where Sarn was chained up, noticed her distress, and then fixed firmly on Phobos. None of the other prisoners interested her in the slightest, the weedy scientist sheltering behind her copy didn't even register, her attention was solely on the other her.

"If you even touched her…"

Phobos smirked. "I haven't _hurt_ her."

Annabelle was staring between the two Nains, as virtually every other Starfleet person in the bay was. She gaped, "There really are two of them!"

"I don't care if you've hurt her or not, I said if you _touched_ her," hissed Alex.

"Well obviously I did," sighed Phobos theatrically. "How else could I have got her here?"

Alex pointed the pistols at her copy's head, the red lethal light glowing brightly on both. Phobos just laughed and wagged a finger. "Not a great idea. Look around us, Alex? Recognise anyone?" She laughed again. "Shoot and I'll duck, you know it. Ready to make if fifteen?"

Drake didn't know what she meant by that but he saw the way Alex grit her teeth and knew that she wouldn't dare risk it. Phobos' bluff – if it had been a bluff – had done the trick.

"Thought so." Phobos pointed her pistols at Alex.

"You won't shoot me."

"Why not?"

Alex was utterly confident as she stated, "For the same reason I won't shoot you."

Drake couldn't believe that. No one who was tied up to the cargo bay wall could believe that Phobos, the woman who had assaulted them, shot them, and strapped them up like animals, honestly cared if she killed them or not. But Alex did.

Corvis seemed to as well.

"You won't be able to duck. No, no, no."

The world behind the young woman seemed to be twisting, as though there were a very intense heat source there; but the air in the bay was cool, and if Alex had been that close to such heat her silly cloak would have burst into flames by now. The air kept twisting, reality distorting. The cargo bay's structure remained unchanged, but when Drake looked through that twisting point it seemed that the bulkheads were melting, disintegrating, and behind them was blackness more complete than the depths of space.

Something was emerging from the darkness. At first he couldn't make anything of it out, just a shadow moving against blackness, but slowly he could see a shape starting to coalesce: tentacles, a bulging body of muscle, snapping mouths and razor-like teeth.

Phobos opened fire. Alex ducked, just as she had said she would. The phase beams burned into the creature's chest and blew its heart into so much blood and gore, spraying all over Doctor Pratchett and Mr Chattaway.

Corvis gasped as the monster died, the unreality vortex that had spawned it snapping shut with a sound like a door slamming, taking the half-formed entity with it. He grasped his chest and sagged to one knee, sweat gripping his forehead, as though the monster's death had taken something out of him as well.

Drake remembered that Corvis controlled the anomaly and all the creatures aboard the ship. He drew them into being and he dictated their actions – except for Phobos, it seemed; she was autonomous. Maybe the bond between creator and creature went deep indeed. Maybe each time one of those things was killed he felt it, their death back lashing through him.

The captain hoped so.

"Why?" Gasped Corvis, looking up at his favourite.

He found himself staring down the barrel of a phase pistol.

Phobos squeezed the trigger and blew his brains out.


	15. Chapter 15

_**Chapter Fourteen**_

Drake stared uncomprehendingly at the headless corpse of Doctor Corvis and the young woman who had killed him. She had holstered her pistols, as had Alex, and the two Nains were watching each other, arms folded. If Alex was dismayed by her copy's casual murder of Corvis she hid it extremely well.

"Why…why did you? Why did she?" Annabelle looked to her lover but he was none the wiser.

Phobos heard Annabelle's baffled voice; she knew the question was in everyone's mind. She chuckled and gestured at Alex. "Tell them."

"He thought he could control her," Alex said coldly, although whether she was addressing Annabelle, the collective group, or the universe in general was undeterminable. "No one controls a Nain. But there's more to it than that. Isn't there, other Alex?"

"Phobos."

"Phobos? What the crap does that mean?"

For the first time the copy showed something other than quiet amusement; with irritation and contempt she said, "Don't play stupid with me, Alex. I'm the last person likely to believe it."

Alex shrugged. "Fear. Subtlety itself."

"Thank you." Phobos took a mock bow. "I had considered 'Nemo' as well."

"No one. How I wish."

The copy Nain smirked. "It seemed appropriate, wouldn't you say? After all, I'm you but I'm not – I'm real but I'm not – I'm no one."

"Could we skip this crap?"

"I think you can indulge me, Alex," bitterly derided Phobos. "After all, it's your fault I'm like this, isn't it?"

Alex took a step towards her nightmare; her fists clenched and raised, her whole body arctic. "Don't try and blame me for what _you've_ done!"

"I'm the way I am because this is what you fear. No stupid monsters, not insects or darkness, or tight spaces, or any of that shit. You fear yourself. The capacity for evil inside you; what you could do if you abandoned morality." She took a bow. "So…here I am. Oh, and please don't waste my time with the dumb act again. I've got your brains. And, unlike you it seems, I'm not afraid to use them."

"I'm not afraid," Alex replied stiffly.

Phobos shook with laughter. "Really? You've never been afraid to show people how clever you are? Really and truly? You've never sat at the back of the class, making stupid jokes because you were bored, the class moving too slowly for you? And when the teacher asked you a question you've never said 'How the hell should I know? I'm dumb, ain't I?' When really you knew perfectly well. You've never intentionally put the wrong answers down on a test, just to make sure you didn't get an A? And you've never listened to one of Walker or Fran or Brok's long, rambling speeches about how this piece of tech does this or that, when you knew perfectly well what it did, and how to make it work better?" She laughed again. "I guess I must have been copied from some _other_ Alex Nain, because I remember doing all that."

Alex looked positively furious, colder than the void, but Phobos wasn't finished yet. "You play dumb really well. You've successfully fooled your enemies and friends alike into dismissing you as an idiot. But _I_ know better. So did Corvis. He knew that you had a brain in your pretty head. Your intellect scared a very smart man into doing something very stupid." She bowed again, very theatrically this time. Most of the people strung up in the cargo bay would have used the opportunity to run up and kick her in the head, if only they had been able to.

"Delith already told me all this," replied Alex through teeth that barely moved.

"Yeah, of course. That was his part."

"I know."

The Nains sunk into silence, Alex glowering furiously at Phobos, who looked particularly pleased with herself. Drake looked on, fascinated by it all. The rest of the captives were fighting and straining, doubly determined to get free now that their captor was so close, and so distracted, but he wasn't. He wanted to hear more.

He finally had the chance to understand his friend!

Annabelle wasn't fighting either. She was too busy trying to understand why Phobos had executed Corvis. Hadn't they been on the same side? And why wasn't Alex shooting that evil clone while she had the chance? What the hell was going on? "Why did she? Why did you kill Corvis? Explain it, for God's sake! Was being number two in Hell not good enough for you? What the hell do you want?"

Phobos glanced over at the other woman, puzzlement lighting her deep red eyes. "I thought I already said?"

Drake knew. The little looks Phobos had given him, the things she had said and done around him, he understood what she had been trying to tell him now. "You've been working against Corvis. For how long?"

"I'm a little over six hours old," she replied. She turned speculative. "Does this mean I'll be grey and wrinkly when I'm twenty?"

"You won't live that long," insisted Alex.

"No," agreed Phobos sadly.

Drake was shocked by what he was hearing. Phobos had hurt all of them, some more than others, but she had also stopped Corvis and his crazy plan. That had to count for something. It earned her life in a cell over death, if nothing else. "Alex! You can't kill her in cold blood."

"I think she's shown that I can, and will," replied Alex, gesturing at Corvis. She eyed Phobos sternly and added, "And don't say that'll make it fifteen."

She shook her head.

Alex stepped closer to her copy. Drake expected them to fight, the two women were tensed, their fists clenched and their crimson eyes narrowed. He thought they would pounce on each other, but it didn't happen. Instead, Alex asked, "How were you going to do it?"

"Corvis plans to expand this anomaly and drag it into Federation space. He's modified the warp field. I've seen his calculations; they're good."

"She's lying," snapped Annabelle. "There is no warp field! The chief destroyed the drive."

Alex understood something she had seen in the stellar cartography lab. "He modified my telescope modifications. Didn't he?"

"Yes."

"Did you…?"

"No. He worked it out for himself." Phobos shook her head. "The irony is if you hadn't used the 'scope as a comm dish, he probably wouldn't have."

"You're saying this is _my_ fault?"

"You gave him the idea that let him fix the warp drive, and you created me," listed Phobos. "You sound pretty guilty to me."

"Watch it, Phobos." Alex warned, her hands twitching near the holsters of her guns.

The captives were still listening in, and Annabelle was still struggling. "I don't understand. What are you two talking about?"

Sarn had been listening as well and she understood. "Alex was able to modify the ship's long-range subspace telescopes to function as transmitters. And Corvis modified them again to replace the damaged warp coils."

"She's pretty smart," teased Phobos.

Alex glared daggers. "Watch what you say. Are you all right, Sarn?"

"I am…unharmed, Alex."

I do not think I will be 'all right' for a long time, she thought miserably.

Alex seemed to know what she was thinking. She drew a phase pistol and glared at Phobos again. For a moment Drake was afraid that she might shoot her copy after all, but then Alex pointed the weapon at Sarn's bonds and told her to close her eyes. The energy beam made short work of the ropes and the Vulcan dropped to the deck. She landed awkwardly and slumped against the wall. She still wouldn't look at either of the Nains.

"What did you do to her?" Alex demanded.

"It hardly matters now, does it?"

Half-heartedly Alex suggested, "We might be able to save them yet."

Phobos shook her head. "In a few minutes this ship will go to warp, heading for Earth, dragging the anomaly behind it. It will engulf the _Endeavour_ in a second – Starfleet will get no warning of what's coming. Once they reach Earth they'll use the deflector modifications to expand the anomaly around the planet. Hell on Earth. It probably won't be as cool the movie."

Drake saw the fight being sucked out of Alex. She sagged, forced to face up to some truth that he couldn't see.

"What about Corvis?" The captain asked. "He was controlling all this. He's dead…"

"Doesn't really matter. The creatures will still follow the orders he gave them before dying. They'll take the ship to Earth."

"For certain," agreed Phobos. "But without Corvis they'll listen to the King's will now. He created this pocket of chaotic space, and he gave control of it to Corvis. Since that pawn's been disposed of…well, maybe more than a pawn. Call him a bishop. Anyway, since he's gone now, control reverts back to the King. And he might not be so keen to keep everyone alive."

"You mean we've made things worse by killing Corvis?"

"Possibly. But he had to die anyway."

It was strange how easily the two Nains conversed. If he were in their place he would have been just a bit freaked out – the man in the mirror suddenly answering back. No matter what duplicate Drake had done, or what he chose to call himself, the captain knew that he would see the man as himself, and he wasn't comfortable with the idea of talking to himself. Alex and Phobos both seemed very natural with it.

Seeing the two of them standing so close he was reminded of the last time he had seen a pair of Nains – in the statue his science team had excavated months ago on an alien world. So that was the answer, he realised. Phobos was the evil Nain figure. One mystery solved.

Alex and Phobos looked into each other's eyes for a long time. The captain got the impression that something significant was passing between them; a conversation without words, but he had no idea what about.

Finally, Alex said. "He's reconfigured the warp field, hasn't he? Made this ship a subspace anchor."

"Yes."

"Invert the field; feed it through the deflector dish…"

Phobos nodded.

"What are they talking about?" Asked Annabelle.

"I don't know," admitted Drake.

Sarn looked up at him, her duty as science officer bringing her out of herself long enough to explain. "They can destroy the anomaly."

That sounded good to the captain. "Then do it!"

The two Nains looked at each other, and again something passed silently between them. They nodded, drew their phase pistols, and started to cut. Within a few moments the captives were lying on the deck, rubbing their sore ankles and wrists. The captain was the first to get to his feet and he walked over to his friend and her demon. He hugged Alex, a quick, friendly embrace that conveyed his relief at her being unharmed more fully than any words could.

"What do we do?" He asked, stepping back, ready to do whatever Alex told him was necessary to put an end to this nightmare.

She looked at him and he had never seen her so sad. Her eyes were hollow, miserable, and hopeless. She was talking of victory, and Drake believed that she was honest about it, but she didn't seem triumphant. She looked utterly defeated.

"_You_ don't do anything," she replied heavily. "Hold your ground here. Phobos is probably right; the things will probably come for you now. You'll have to fight them."

"Your weapons are in that crate," Phobos added, flicking her thumb at one of the few boxes in the bay – months of deep space work had taken their toll on the ship's supplies. "My particle cannon, too. It's still good for a couple of shots. Just make sure none of the good guys are in the line of fire when you squeeze the trigger."

"Are we counting you in that group now?" Demanded Chattaway hostilely.

"Up to you. Sorry about hitting you with that pipe, by the way."

He gave her the finger and went to get the weapons. Phobos wasn't bothered by his hatred. She wasn't stupid enough to expect any of them to ever forgive her. It saddened her a bit. She had such great memories with these people, she had treasured their friendship, but it was all gone now.

I'll just have to make new friends, she told herself. Then she laughed at how stupid that thought was.

"If you're right about the monsters that's all the more reason for us to stick together. We'll come with you."

Alex shook her head. "You can't. Only Phobos and I know how to control the dimensional anomalies. We can get to the engine room. You'll probably end up in a corridor or something, everyone scattered randomly throughout the ship again. Stay here and stay together. It's safest."

Phobos felt like adding, "We'll be back as soon as we can."

Drake nodded, accepting the promise. But he also put a hand firmly on Phobos' shoulder and made her face him. "If you're thinking of betraying us…"

She looked at him and said very seriously, "I'm not a monster, Will. Well…maybe a little. Not literally a monster, anyway. I don't want to see Hell engulf my homeworld. I have loved ones back there."

Alex tapped her copy on the shoulder. "Let's go. Good luck, Will."

"You too, Alex. See you soon."

She didn't reply. The two Nains walked silently out of the cargo bay, disappearing as they passed through the door.

Sarn knew why Alex hadn't said anything. She didn't believe in giving false hope.

She would never see Drake again, just as surely as Sarn would never see the woman she loved again.

Alex and Phobos's plan would seal the anomaly once and for all, but it would destroy the _Von Braun_ in the process.

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Tholiar looked down at the remains of the Ice Demon, a four-armed humanoid, covered entirely in snowy fur, about again as tall as the Andorian woman. As a child she had had a fascination with the Aenar sub-species of her people and had devoted a bit of time and effort to learning about them. She had even had an Aenar pen friend for a time. She recognised this creature from one of the Aenar stories that she had read, about an arrogant young Aenar, over-reliant on his telepathic abilities. He was forever bragging about how brave and smart he was, and one day, to prove it, he went off to explore a stretch of icy tunnel outside his home city – a passage forbidden by the wiser adults. Inevitably, he got lost. For days he wandered, desperately trying to find his way back to where he belonged, all the time getting farther and farther from home. Eventually, he happened upon another living creature. Nearly starved and delirious, he reached out to touch the entity's mind and found it familiar, comforting. He let it lead him, thinking it was taking him home.

The story didn't have a happy ending for the young man. As Tholiar remembered, the moral was not to rely too much on one sense, even telepathy, for it could be your undoing.

Repeated pulse rifle shots at point blank range had been this thing's undoing, she saw. The chest fur was badly scorched and matted with blood where it had been shot. She could see the charred remnants of internal organs – something that looked like it might have been a heart, bits of muscle – through the blast holes.

"That one took a lot of killing," said Miho Inogashira. The security chief was tired and dirty from the fight to put down the monstrous boarders. She should have been in her cabin, relaxing in a hot bath, and would have been if she hadn't heard that the first officer wanted to see the corpses. As soon as word had reached her she had rushed to the cargo bay. She still had a phase pistol in hand, as though worried that the monster might wake up again.

"You're acting like you recognise it."

"I do. It's a creature from mythology."

"Andorian?"

"Aenar, in fact." She touched the creature's fur. It looked soft and clean from a distance, but it was really oily and matted, sweat and dirt weaved between the hairs.

Doctor Ilerson joined them, tugging off his surgical gloves. Under the first officer's orders he had been performing autopsies on the dead creatures, and he wore a bloody smock. The doctor had refused to allow any of the bodies into sickbay, not when he had so many wounded crewmen to tend to from the failed invasion. The empty number four cargo bay had been transformed into a temporary morgue. Or was abattoir a more apt description, Tholiar mused.

"Not mythical anymore," Ilerson said. "And that's not the only example we've got here. There's a red devil, horns and all, on the slab now. I've just finished with it."

It took Tholiar a moment to recall that a red devil was the traditional form of the evil god in one of the human religions – she couldn't remember which, and didn't care enough to find out.

"Anything to report, Doctor?"

"Nothing very useful, really. All of the creatures seem to be based, physiologically, on the species that first…dreamt them up, for lack of a better term. This creature, for example. You said it was from Aenar mythology?"

"That's right."

"I could have told you that without knowing it. Look at the genetic makeup. And the structure of the liver. The brain. All based on Aenar physiology. The devil I was examining just now? Essentially human."

"That devil incinerated Ensign Cash with a fireball, Doctor," said Inogashira. "Humans don't often do that."

"No. There are some extra bits and pieces, organs that I can't make any sense of. And the muscle power is vastly improved over human norm. That thing must have been incredible strong. Just as I would imagine a demon to be. But genetically, it's basically human."

"What does that mean?"

"I don't really know," admitted the doctor. "Perhaps that anomaly is reconfiguring the _Von Braun_'s crewmen. But why it would transform them into these creatures is a mystery to me."

Tholiar looked around at the corpses, thinking. "These are all depictions of evil. Could that have something to do with it?"

"Maybe. If there's a psychic element to the anomaly or something like that. I don't know. The person who would…"

"I will be visiting her next. Thank you, Doctor. Record all of your findings, then incinerate the bodies and space the remains."

Ilerson blinked, the order taking him by surprise. "Are you sure, sir? Being able to study these in more detail on Earth…the findings we could make…"

She looked him square in the eye and told him in no uncertain terms, "These are the spawn of the Abyss, Doctor. They go nowhere near Earth, or any other Federation world. Record your findings and destroy the bodies."

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Susan was sitting on the thin bunk, the only furniture in the brig cell, kicking her feet idly. Tholiar approached the cell's reinforced transparent aluminium door. Originally, the _Endeavour_'s cells had been equipped solely with force fields, but Drake had taken one look at them and demanded that proper doors be fitted as well. His argument had been that if the power went down a force field would just disappear; a door would still be there, still preventing escape. The spacedock engineers hadn't been happy with the addition to their workload, but with the ship's captain and first officer unified against them they had had no choice.

On the wall next to the door was the comm button and Tholiar held it down with her thumb. Susan's voice came out of the speaker tinny. "I tried to warn you."

"I should have listened. I am willing to listen now."

"The bodies. You want to know where they came from?"

Tholiar nodded.

"The anomaly is a rift into a chaotic dimension. Different physical and natural laws apply there. People live there. Kana knows them as the Enemy."

"Who is Kana?"

"The Dark Soul."

Tholiar frowned. That was familiar, it was what Susan called Alex, but who was this Kana? It wasn't even Alex's middle name.

Susan continued: "The Enemy made contact with the King. He lured ships to the rift and trapped them. He is a powerful psychic. Much more powerful than me. He can sense minds across dozens of light years. He looks into the minds of the people trapped in the anomaly and then he uses its link to chaos to create their worst fears. He bases the monsters on the people who fantasise them. An Andorian nightmare will have Andorian DNA."

"Like the demons we have aboard?"

"Yes. That story terrified Delith, like it scared you. So the King made it real for him. He enjoys listening to peoples' screams. He's mad."

"He sounds it. What happened to our crew?"

"He made their fears, of course. One of the Von Brauns was his agent. He was in command of the Hell aboard _Von Braun_. The King does that for each ship – he picks out one special one to be his emissary. This time it was Corvis."

Tholiar recognised the name from her study of the _Von Braun_'s manifest.

Susan continued: "Corvis was afraid of Alex. So he made Alex's fear – Phobos. An Alex without her morals. Corvis thought that Phobos was working for him, but she tricked him. Killed him. Now Alex and Phobos are going to seal the anomaly forever."

"How?"

"A collapsing warp field," replied Susan. She still didn't look up. Her voice and her expression were distant, barren. "It will destroy the anomaly, the _Von Braun_, and all the other ships trapped there."

Tholiar wanted to dismiss everything Susan had said as a fantasy, but she couldn't. Not after everything that had happened. She was appalled by what she was hearing. "What about our people?"

"They'll be killed."

"I have to send in the shuttles."

Susan shook her head. "It's too late."

"What do –"

The ship's intercom whistled and Lieutenant Brok called, "Bridge to Commander Tholiar. Bridge to the first officer."

With a final glance over her shoulder at Susan she ran to the nearest wall comm panel. "Tholiar here."

"Sir, we're registering a massive subspace emanation from the _Von Braun_. Mr Green reports that its pattern strongly resembles a warp field."

"A warp field?"

"Yes, sir. And there's more. The field is massive, sir. The other ships inside the anomaly are adding their power to it. It encompasses the entire anomaly."

Aghast, Tholiar snapped around to look at Susan again.

"Far too late."

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The engine room stank like a slaughterhouse. Corvis' 'children' lay where they fell, cut open by the beams of fire the two Alex Nains had swept the room with. Nothing had escaped, nothing had been allowed to run or hide. Mercilessly, relentlessly, they had swept through the engine room and killed everything that they encountered.

Now they had their backs to the corpses, working frantically on the exposed warp control circuits that had so recently been modified by the creatures. Neither Nain gave any thought to the culling they had just performed. Alex had killed often in her life, and Phobos had all of her memories. Even the stink of blood and burnt flesh and fur didn't distract them.

They hadn't spoken since they had left the cargo bay; there had been no need, nothing to say. They had both known how they were going to take the engine room at the same time, knowing exactly what the other would do; they both knew how to reconfigure the warp drive and deflector array to achieve what they wanted. Words were irrelevant.

Alex thought about her demon as she worked. There was no need for her to concentrate on what she was doing; she had enough brainpower to perform her task with plenty left over. Phobos was everything that she had ever imagined, everything that she had feared that she could become. She was scheming and callous, ready to do anything to achieve her goals, and while she hadn't drawn on it Alex knew that somewhere, hidden inside her, was Kana's power. She was a fiend.

Kana was standing and watching the two Alexs worked. She remarked to her host, _"For a demon, she's really not that bad."_

"_How can you say that? After everything she did?"_

"_What did she do, exactly?"_

"_She attacked our friends, murdered Corvis."_

"_You were planning to kill him yourself. And as for attacking your friends, have you not worked out what she really did?"_

"_She shot them and hung them from the walls! She traumatised Sarn!"_

"_She gathered up people who were lost and scattered throughout this ship and put them all in one place, where they would have a fighting chance to survive when Corvis died and the monsters turned feral."_ Kana told her. _"Whatever minor inconvenience they suffered, in the long run they're better off because of it."_

"You two are talking about me," came an accusatory comment from the other side of the room. Alex knew that the faux her couldn't actually hear Kana or her having their mental conversations, but she intimately understood the workings of their mind, and that was almost as good.

It didn't prevent her from feebly lying, "No, we're not."

Phobos glanced at her original. "You know, I miss that voice in my head. It's so lonely in here now."

"I feel really sorry for you."

"Well, you should," agreed Phobos. "You're the reason I'm like this, remember? I'm your nasty fantasy."

Alex bit her tongue to keep the abuse from flowing. Because, in the end, Phobos was right. She had had the nightmare; Phobos was the way she was because that was what _she_ feared.

She still didn't like taking the blame for her copy's evil.

"That does it," said Phobos triumphantly, leaping to her feet and dusting off her hands. "I've rigged the warp coils. How are you coming?"

"Nearly done."

Phobos walked over to the main console table in the middle of the room, shoving the corpse of a brown, leathery humanoid onto the floor. She used her cloak to soak up some of the spilt blood and flicked a switch. A red light came on and a screen lit with a warning that warp field stability would be compromised if she kept doing what she was doing. She ignored it and flicked another switch.

Bored, she decided to make small talk. "How do you feel about Sarn, by the way?"

Alex swore as she brushed her fingers against an exposed ODN line, earning herself a nasty burn. It faded quickly, Kana's kindly influence aiding her body's natural regeneration. She appreciated the gesture, even if it was a little irrelevant at this stage. "This really isn't the time."

"We'll be dead in ten minutes, so it really can't wait."

The original Nain sighed and answered, "I love her."

"Really?"

"Yeah." Then Alex stopped and thought about what she had said. Really thought about it. All that time she had spent pondering over her feelings, analysing them every which way, and she hadn't been able to work it out. Just now, the answer had come as naturally as that. She found herself smiling, overjoyed despite the situation. "Yeah. Yeah, I really do. I really do!"

Phobos smiled as well. "I'm glad. I'm just sorry…"

"Some things aren't meant to be, I guess." She pressed the last cable home and stood up.

"_Ready, Kana?"_

"_I suppose."_

She nodded and Phobos threw the final switch. Immediately, alarms began to blare throughout the ship, the warp core's healthy thrum changed to a wail as its force fields came under sudden strain from the massive increase in rate of reaction. Consoles and power couplings around the engine room, around the whole research vessel, began to blow out one by one in geysers of sparks and flame. The lighting failed, first the main and then the auxiliary lights, so that the ship was in total darkness, and then the computers started to shut down other systems, beginning with the secondaries and building up to the primaries as it stole whatever power it could to maintain the core's integrity fields. Gravity disappeared, and an instant later heating shut down, followed by air circulation. There was still enough heat and oxygen in the ship to sustain the crew for hours, or would be if the core lasted that long, but it wasn't going to. Every second the whine was getting louder, more desperate; the ship's heart was on the verge of having an attack.

"_I'm sorry, Kana."_

The ancient alien looked at her counterpart and she grinned. Her expression held no fear, no sorrow, no regrets. _"For what? The best years of my life?"_

She couldn't hug Kana, but she could hug Phobos. Alex and her demon embraced each other for the first and last time. They whispered their goodbyes.

The wail of the core changed pitch. Breach was imminent.

Alex closed her eyes and thought of Sarn. She pictured the Vulcan's ears, her jet-black hair, her slim swept eyebrows, her deeply intelligent brown eyes, those soft and sensuous lips. She remembered the first kiss that they had shared, its touch, its taste, its ecstasy. She wanted to hold onto that moment until the very end.

"I love you."

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"The anomaly is collapsing," said Carth Green.

"Another ship has exploded," added Brok.

Tholiar didn't care about any of that. Her focus was on the _Von Braun_, its magnified image filling the view screen. She kept willing the vessel's core to hold together, kept hoping to see a flock of lifeboats lifting from it and thrusting to safety. She had to get her shipmates back. She wouldn't lose them. She wouldn't allow that to happen!

Not again.

"Are we in transporter range?"

"Not yet, Commander," said Lance. He was bringing the starship in as the anomaly continued to collapse. The transporter room had a lock on all of their people; they were just waiting for the signal to clear enough to be able to bring them aboard. But the _Von Braun_ was at the centre of the spatial distortion. It wouldn't be clear until the anomaly was completely gone.

"The _Von Braun_'s core is going critical."

"Mr Riker."

"Not ye –"

There was no need to finish.

The _Von Braun_ became a miniature sun, lighting up the depths of space with its glorious white brilliance. It existed for only the space of a heartbeat, and then the furious lightshow of the massive antimatter explosion faded and all that was left of the starship and its occupants was gamma radiation.

Tholiar gaped at the view screen for what seemed like forever. Then she broke down and wept.

_STAR TREK: Endeavour NCC-194_

_Will continue in 'Her Divided Souls'_


End file.
